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LAST DAYS 
OF LINCOLN 

AND 

LYRICAL SKETCHES 



Cofyrifrht igcf, by 

JOHN lliviNG PEARCE, JR. 

All rights reserved. 



LIBR/^KV of CONtiRESS 
Two Copies Received 



APR 4 1904 

a Copyright Entry 
CLASS «- XXc. No. 
^ COPY 3 



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- •ncoln'a . i ^ 



REVISED AXD ENLARGED 
THIRD EDITION. 



Published b> 
Laird & Lee 
At Chicago. 



COVER DESIGN 

by Robert Nelson Place 

TITLE PAGE 
by Ben M. French 

ILLUSTRATED 

FROM PEN AND INK DRAWINGS 

by E. W. Hoehn 

Allen E. Philbrick 

and 

Frank Turner Godfrey 



INDEX OF CONTENTS. 

Anna, 97 

April Snow, 64. 

Barn, The, 49 

Battle Hymn of Humanity, The, 84 

Beauty's Eyes, 67 

Birth of the Graces, The, 46 

Blanche and Isabel, 32 

Broiled Lobster, zi 

Carrie, 115 

Catherine, 136 

Cecelia, 108 

Childhood's Charm, ^^ 

Christmas Tree, The, 81 

Come, Fame ! 90 

Contrasts, no 

Death of the Lobster, The, 36 

Decoration Day, 79 

Dorothy, 119 

Dream, The, 20 

Dying Year, The, 148 

Easter, 76 

Easter Morning Song, An, 61 

Edith, 52 

Emeline, 126 

Even-tide, 54 

Faded Wreath, The, 106 

Felicity, 78 

Grandfather's House, 59 

Growing Old, 16 

Harriet, 15 

Hast Ever Been in Heaven? 95 

Heart Cry The, 48 

Heart's-ease, 18 



Helen, lo 

Her Wedding Night, 117 

If I Had Thought, 122 

Isabel and Blanche, 33 

John Marshall, 30 

Jennie, 29 

Karra, 62 

Last Days of Lincoln, 6 

Listen ! 98 

Looking Backwards, in 

Looking In At The Window, 99 

Looking Through a Lady's Shutter, 132 

Lost Dream, The, 118 

Love Lives Forever, 40 

Love's Three Degrees, 93 

Lutie, 128 

Marguerite, 103 

Marjorie, 38 

Mary, 82 

Midst the Evening's Red and Gold, 151 

Mildred, 112 

Music, 92 

My Little Boy and I, 83 

Myrtle, 71 

My Son, 23 

Mystery, The, 124 

Nature's Solitude, 27 

New Century, The, 69 

Nor Heaven Nor Hell, 39 

Ode On a Lady's Hat, 105 

Old Daguerrotype, The, 28 

Olive, 88 

On the Banks of St. Joe River, 145 

Our Sisters-in-Law, 134 

Oh! Why Should Thy Heart? 26 



Pearl, 139 

Poet at the Banquet, The, 153 

Pour Passer le Temps, 74 

Rose, 56 

Rose of Bethlehem, The, 72 

Ruth, 100 

Sea, The, 113 

Shall We Meet?— a Song, 137 

Silver Bell, The, 102 

Sisters, The, 22 

Spes Mea Christus, 143 

Sunset, The, 55 

Tempus Fugit, 66 

Those Pleasant Houvs, 127 

To a Baby's Face, 41 

To a Face Behind a Fan — a fragment, 116 

Toasts, 149 

Together in One Bed We Sleep, 141 

To My Valentine, 140 

To My Wife, 5 

Transvaal, 34 

Traveling On the Train, 11 

Verna, 44 

Violet, The, 58 

Virtue's Humble Couch, 24 

War, 13 

When Scot Forgets His Mother-Tongue, 130 

When the Evening Fades Away, 104 

When the Last Kiss is Given, and Lovers Must 

Part, 120 
Why Do You wait? 86 
Why Must W^e Forget When We Should 

Remember? 138 
Winter Thoughts — a pastoral, 153 
Yale, Farewell ! 164 

iii 



INDEX OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Frontispiece 

Title Page, Ben M. French 

Last Days of Lincoln, E. W. Hoehn, 6 

Helen, A. E. Philbrick, lo 

Growing Old, E. W, Hoehn, i6 

The Sisters, E. W. Hoehn, 22 

Nature's Solitude, E. W. Hoehn, 27 

The Old Daguerreotype, F. T. Godfrey, 28 

Blanche and Isabel, F. T. Godfrey, 32 

Broiled Lobster, F. T. Godfrey, 37 

Love Lives Forever, A- E. Philbrick, 40 

To a Baby's Face, A. E. Philbrick, 41 

The Birth of the Graces, E. W. Hoehn, 46 

The Barn, E. W. Hoehn, 49 

Rose, A. E. Philbrick, 56 

Grandfather's House, E. W. Hoehn, 59 

April Snow, E. W. Hoehn, 64 

Tempus Fugit, A. E. Philbrick, 66 

The Rose of Bethlehem, E. W. Hoehn, 72 

Pour Passer le Temps, A. E. Philbrick, 74 

Easter, E. W. Hoehn, 76 

Felicity, F. T. Godfrey, 78 

Mary, A. E. Philbrick, 82 

My Little Boy and I, E. W. Hoehn, 83 

Olive, A. E. Philbrick, 88 

Music, E. W. Hoehn, 92 

Anna, F. T. Godfrey, 97 

Marguerite, E. W. Hoehn, 103 

Ode on a Lady's Hat, A. E. Philbrick, 105 

To a Face Behind a Fan, A^ E. Philbrick, 116 

The Sea, A. E. Philbrick, 113 

Carrie, E. W. Hoehn, 115 



When the Last Kiss Is Given and Lovers Must 
Part, F. T. Godfrey, 120 

Emeline, A. E. Philbrick, 126 

Looking Through a Lady's Shutter, F. T. God- 
frey, 132 

Catherine, E. IV. Toehn, 136 

Shall We Meet? A. E. Philbrick, 137 

Spes Mea Christus, F. T. Godfrey, 143 

The Dying Year, F. T. Godfrey, 148 

The Snow Lies White on the Frozen Grass, 
E. W. Hoehn, 155 

The Farmer's Wife, with Sparkling Eye, Pre- 
pares the Succulent Apple Pie, E. W. 
Hoehn, 156 

The Wood Fire Crackles on the Hearth, 
E. W. Hoehn, 157 

The Church Bells, on Each Sabbath Morn, 
E. W. Hoehn, 158 

Oft When the Preacher Stops to Dine, 
E. W. Hoehn, 159 

Yet Village Churchyards Filled with Stones, 
E. W. Hoehn, 160 

With Eager Expectation Wait His Wife and 
Children at the Gate, E. W. Hoehn, 161 

Bed Time, That Bugaboo of Youth, E. W. Hoehn, 
162 

So, Wordless and With Dreamy Mind, Upon 
Some Verdant Bank Reclined, A. E. Phil- 
brick, 163 



TO MY WIFE. 

There is no dream that I could dream 

That's half so sweet as dreams of you ; 
There is no thought that I can think 

That can compare with thoughts of you; 
I have no hope that I can hope 

That's half so dear as hopes of you ; 
There is no life that's half the life 

My life has been for love of you. 



LAST DAYS OF LINCOLN. 

When on that April night of long ago, 
From fiend incarnate fell the dastard blow 
Whose agony more cruelly was felt 
By millions than by him the blow was dealt; 

A doubting silence spread its lightning wing 
O'er farm and city, tingeing everything 
With that deep melancholy which the dead, 
Immortal martyrs in their passing shed. 

One drop of blood, soaked from the marble stair 
Up which they carried him, to languish there, 
By simple child, on paper, in a trice 
Changed hands a hundred times at fab'lous price. 

The banners of victorious hosts that threw 

Their joyous tale to every wind that blew. 

Were stripped, dishonored, in next morning's 

glow. 
Displaced by the dread draperies of woe. 

With bended heads, white faces and knit brows, 
All men left their appointedi tasks ; and vows 
Sworn vehemently, touched the pallid lip ; 
And hand to hand pledged vengeance in its grip. 

The approaching day of God stirred memories 
That ne'er had wakened till the souls of these, 
Disrupt from their exceeding calm of peace, 
Were born again, as was the art of Greece, 



All knew then he had loved them, though un- 
known ; 
Each felt the sad bereavement as his own; 
The conquerors grew helpless in their loss ; 
The foe forgiven feared a sterner cross. 

And yet the crisis passed, because his love 
Reflected that of purest Heaven above ; 
And angered men were lenient, knowing not 
Their mercy was of Lincoln's heart begot. 

And now minds tasked their ingenuity 

To honor him who in so full degree 

Had drained the font of prophecy, to lead 

His children to their promised land of meed. 

The soldiers of the rival arms excelled 

In pouring out the reverence each held 

For him who taught the bleeding heart to dwell 

More fondly on the fields where heroes fell. 

Yet not to its last resting place forlorn 
Was the dumb clay of this sad minstrel borne; 
But at his feet his loved son was laid ; 
Nor death had for his prayers its sickle stayed. 

Bare-head round solemn catafalque there passed 
Both young and old, all weeping; while, enmassed 
In every distant hamlet, friend and foe 
Wreathed immortelles of thought upon his brow. 

Came then the bitter parting when his form, 
Close-watched by veterans of war's dark storm, 
Swift-coursing with the train's cold, iron roar. 
Left the fair Capitol 'twould grace no more. 



'Neath arches built by reverent hearts it sped, 
Past beacon lights adoring hands had fed; 
By town and farm, and in woods lonely-placed, 
The people kneeled and prayed, as past them 
raced 

AH that their mourning eyes might ever see 
Of him whose fame survives eternity : 
Nor rain, nor darkness broke the faithful line 
Of worshipers of this tried soul divine. 

In each great city where his body lay 
Imposing in its state, there flocked by day 
Uncounted myriads from miles around. 
Whose dirgeful tread through midnight shook 
the ground. 

The negro, yet untaught to sell his vote, 
To freedom new, from slavery not remote. 
Sobbed miserably above the fading face 
Of him who broke the shackles from his race. 

The soldier, who had naught but honor left. 
His body racked with wounds, his fortune cleft 
In twain a thousand times by brave neglect, 
Grieved that he died not with this chief elect. 

Near early scenes of boyhood's simple sighs, 
In silence and with blind, unseeing eyes. 
He homeward drew at last, to rest among 
The willows where his youthful harp had hung. 

Here tears were real indeed, hearts broken quite. 
And memories awakened in the night ; 
Each hearth was haunted by a ghost unknown, 
And terror claimed his comrades for its own. 

8 



Through devious saddened wanderings this man 
Had drifted back to where his toil began ; 
But history and right had both been blest 
By him before his spirit found its rest 

'Neath dedicated shaft, in hallowed spot, 
His lineaments were laid away to rot ; 
But rust cannot corrode the good he did, 
And from the eye of God no grace is hid. 

Within a wood where once a village stood, 
A lonely grave-stone marks a womanhood 
Long since elapsed and gone the eternal way; 
Nor greatness could, nor love, its glory stay. 

And on that tomb, neglected and forgot, 

Is writ in letters that have perished not 

"Anne Rutledge," — sweetest name man ever 

knew — 
And 'neath this simple name is sculpt' : "Here too 

My heart lies buried, Abraham Lincoln" — true 
To his first love, as to his love of truth. 
He left hope's light undimmed where'er he trod, 
And told his own despair alone to God. 

Such treasures are the wealth of nations held 
In single hands that have the power to weld 
Affection with the great affairs of life. 
Yet falter not when fratricide is rife. 

No longer doubt and sneers and hatred reign : 

Let charity, of malice shorn, remain, 

The greatest monument man ever reared 

To him who loved and fought, but never feared. 



HELEN. 

Oh ! may thy poorest hopes ne'er die 

But e'en in death to multiply, 

And may no sad thoughts bed with thee 

To mar thy dreams' fehcity : 

Dear, may thine wak'ning eyes behold 

A green world bathed in mists of gold, 

Where fancy wanders far from care. 

And all thy youthful idols are. 

And, Helen, on thy form and face 

May beauty all its madness trace 

Forever, and no touch of time 

Defile thy nature, now sublime. 



TRAVELING ON THE TRAIN. 

In steel-winged flight the train goes screaming 
through the fields 
Where cattle pass their peaceful days ; 
And rivers, caught between their graceful banks 
of green, 
Flow on, regardless of man's ways. 

The balsam from the encroaching woods, fresh 
carpeted 

With lights and shadows by the sun, 
Blows in upon the travelers in grateful breaths ; 

As if it called each tired one. 

The quiet hamlets hugged against the iron rails 
That bear the swift world's throb along. 

Through leafy dells and highlands smooth with 
sunning grain ; 
With soul-refreshing rev'ries throng. 

The children, with their bare and sun-browned, 
slender legs. 
And shy, bucolic diffidence; 
Gaze, wild-eyed, on this messenger from un- 
known spheres ; 
While colts race with it to the fence. 

The swift-retreating, gleaming tracks, seen 
through the dust 

Whirled on the wild flowers by the train. 
Seem to close up behind it and fore'er shut out 

The memory of every pain. 



II 



The purpling sunset on the silver stillness of 

Some eye-caressing inland lake, 
Gives place in quick succession to the shoreless 
sea 

Of undulating, wind-swept brake. 

The plowman, driving home his weary, faded 
team. 

The good wife trudging by his side, 
With cooing babe, triumphant on her sturdy arm ; 

Fill in the glow of even-tide. 

The scented dampness from the dew-wet grass 
of dusk, 

The wheat-shocks whit'ning to the moon. 
The quietude of the vast, care-dispelling night; 

Take their departure all too soon. 

And in another morn, care-born, we wake again, 

Wrapt in the mantle of regret ; 
But cherishing in dreams, through sultry city 
nights. 

The country's rural beauties yet. 



12 



WAR. 

What's War? It is "hell," according to Sherman: 
Who are you that, self-called, man's estate shall 

determine? 
Have you ever been wounded or wasted away 
In the enemy's prison? If so, could you say, 
When in pangs of starvation, (and believe it 

was true) 
That your freedom you'd give for the red, white 

and blue? 
And who are these freemen who proffer their life 
To the smoke of the gun and the gleam of the 

knife? 
They are not the wise men, — nor yet you and I — 
But the poor men who seem all alike to our eye. 
They count not the loss; self value, they have 

none; 
Like cattle they toss on the ocean's abandon ; 
At the instant command — at the gateway of hell — 
Of paid masters, they land and child-devils dispel. 
When they die, there's one less of people we 

know not, 
To wander the earth at behest of war's despot ; 
While we who stay home of our patriots prate. 
And bid the poor soldier march on to his fate. 
We pay them for courting that death which we 

dread, 
A stipend so meager, their children lack bread ; 
We gloat o'er the vict'ries we've won with their 

blood ; 
In the cunning of safety, admire their manhood. 
What is glory but folly? What is death but a 

box 
In a grave unannointed,'neath mud and the rocks? 

13 



How content could you die far from those whom 

you love, 
In the heat of the plain and the damp of the 

grove ? 
And this we call progress and civilization ! 
If you had to die, would you care for the nation? 
Or would you not rather remain as you were. 
Than for knowledge's advance death's oblivion 

incur? 
'Tis lucky for those who're too good to be shot, 
That poor heroes are plenty, and blood still 

runs hot 
In the veins of the masses, who childlike, have 

given 
Their lives, hopes and loves — in war's agonies 

striven ; 
That those who consider themselves far above 

them, 
May live unmolested to solve progress's problem. 



14 



HARRIET. 

Just sixteen sweet summers have gilded thy hair 
With the bloom of youth's loveliness, rioting 

there 
Midst the scents of love phials that Cupid has 

spilled 
All over thy bosom so ecstasy-filled. 

And where is the bold one would tempt thee 

away 
From the charm of thy maidenhood's pleasures' 

array ? 
The dull lessons of wisdom so dearly are bought, 
'Tvvere better to stay young and miss them — 

why not ? 



15 



GROWING OLD. 

We are so poor, so old, so tired, 
Disheartened, sick and burden-prest : 

God, let the bitter cup pass from us ; 
Oh, take us now and give us rest ! 

So long since we were young and merry; 

So long we've lingered in decay, 
With Hope's bright orb long set beyond us : 

Lord, come and take the pain away ! 

The days are dark, the nights so fright'ning, 
And human glances turned lo stone ; 

The world we loved so, now disowns us : 
Lord, make our home thine ageless throne ! 

These wrinkles that our forms disgrace. 
And cause the eye to drop in shame ; 

God, take them from us with the breath 
That tenants yet the wasted frame I 

It is so sad to grow old — 
To feel each weak'ning power wane ; 

The shadow of the grave before us 
Mars all the future can contain. 

And, when we gaze on one another, 
The dread has doubly grewsome grown; 

For then each other's daily failing 
The mirror holds up to our own. 

But take my hand, dear, weary helpmeet; 

Together we will plight again 
The troth our youth found so inviting; 

And no regrets the end shall stain. 

i6 



And thus we'll journey the decline 
Of life's once sweet and scented vale; 

And at its foot we'll leave behind 
The lowly mound's forgotten tale. 



17 



HEART'S-EASE. 

My heart has wandered where it willed so long, 
so long ; 

Yet never found a harbor for its anchor aye, 
Until love's message on thy lips so rare, so rare, 

Came to enchain it — with thy prayerful eye. 

'Tis bliss to listen to thy voice so sweet, so sweet ; 
'Tis more than bliss to watch the color come 
and go 
Upon thy tell-tale cheeks and neck so white, so 
white. 
Like carmine sunset on the dazzling snow. 

I know not whence such magic's come to thee, to 
thee, 

To fair ensnare me in thy net so merciless ; 
But oh! 'tis happiness to lie so calm, so calm, 

And on thy fragrant breast my love confess. 

One moment let thy lips on mine so cold, so cold, 
Drop slowly down in rapt'rous, nestling flight, 
to rest : 
Ah ! love, what nectar had the gods so spiced, so 
spiced. 
With nameless fascination unreprest? 

To hold in my unconscious arms so close, so close, 
Thy unresisting form, and feel thy panting 
breath 
Beat askance on my answering heart, so keen, 
so keen 
To love thee madly, kills the sting of death. 



There's naught nor none could tempt my heart, 
so charmed, so charmed, 
To break these welcome bonds, and venture on 
again : 
With all of passion and felicity acute, acute, 
Exhausted in thy love, what can remain? 



19 



THE DREAM. 

I lay at midnight in my bed, 
When e'en the nightingale was still, 

And coy winds rocked the trees to sleep, 
And mute reposed the whip-poor-will. 

And, as I lay, my helmless mind 
Gyrated through the mistful field 

Of afterthought — futurity, 
Kaleidoscopic — half-revealed. 

I dreamed the wisdom of the gods 
I stood and drank at fame's swift fount; 

Success-elated, held the reins, 
On glory's stirrup soon to mount. 

Again, I dreamed in felon's cell 
I wrote my greatness on the wall 

That might restrain a broken heart. 
But genius baffled not at all. 

I dreamed I held an ard'rous maid 
(She had thy features and thy form) 

Within my arms — against my heart, 
And felt her heat my body warm. 

I dreamed 1 sped o'er glinting seas 
That rose and sunk to rhythmic wave. 

And closed my eyes in sunny sleep — 
The sleep that slumber's vision gave. 

On sun-kissed sands I heard the breeze 

Of perfume-laden fairy climes 
Low whisper through the gossam'ry trees 

Of unrecorded dreamland times. 

20 



I held the thread of many a tale 

Unbroken, through weird phantasms traced, 
What seemed to me forever, till 

By other scenes 'twas fast effaced. 

I grieved in abject misery 

O'er wrongs I could not rise to right : 
Amphorous are the changeling thoughts 

That visit us uncalled by night. 

My hand to strike, my heart to feel, 

My mind to reason, soul to fly ; 
In vain beat on the prison bars 

Of Morpheus till dawn was nigh. 

I woke, and felt the breath of morn 
Blow cool, refreshing, on my brow; 

But all the children of my dream 
Are buried in oblivion now. 



ai 



THE SISTERS. 

There are two sisters, both so sweet 
I cannot choose the sweeter; 

Two roses ne'er grew more alike, 
Four ankles ne'er were neater. 

Now it is Maud and now 'tis May 
That holds my heart enchanted, 

Cooling its fever like the brook 
For which the wild hart panted. 

In Maud's sad smile compassion lurks, 
In May's gay laughter pleasure ; 

Yet in the eyes of both dear maids 
Loves dance to mirthful measure. 

'Tis rapt'rous to be sad with Maud 

As to be glad with May ; 
In arms of both I'm nothing loath 

To scare despair away. 

For, oh ! to love or to be loved 

By either one, so fair, 
Would steal the miseries from fate 

And leave its blisses there. 

So bright, so sweet, so kind, so good, 
So filled with charming womanhood! 
My heart must linger many a day 
Between its choice of Maud or May, 



22 



MY SON. 

I had a little son, and his name was John — 

A lovely child was he ; 
His hair was soft as the zephyr's breath, 

And cool as the star-lit sea. 

His smile was sweet as an angel's face, 

His lips the dampest pink. 
His heart as tender as the spring's young bud 

That nods at the bobolink. 

His laugh would awaken the saddest soul 

From dreams of dread despair ; 
And the patter of his feet soothed me to sleep, 

Like raindrops beating there. 

Across his grave the adoring sun 

Now lays its rays of gold ; 
But all their grandeur seems as naught 

Beside my love untold. 



23 



VIRTUE'S HUMBLE COUCH. 

When virtue on its humble couch 
With easeful conscience lies outstretched, 

Pure are its dreams and sweet its rest, 
Untroubled by thoughts anger-fetched. 

For virtue is its own reward, 

And chaste as beauty unadorned ; 

No sun-chased shadow disappears 
More traceless than lost virtue mourned. 

Dear are the charms that virtue holds, 
Deep the regrets its absence calls ; 

But purity is found as well 
In lowly cot as marble halls. 

Although they're priceless, all may own 

Its self-respecting attributes, 
Its freedom from distressing taint, 

And boldness that all ill refutes. 

Dawn and sunset both are bright 
To eyes that by no self-reproach 

Are blinded to their kindly light, 
And honor's soul in glances broach. 

How bootless is the paltry gain 

Dishonor ofifers in return 
For all that's wasted in attempts 

That blight the soul and faces burn? 

For though the world and all were thine. 
And though thyself hadst conquered not; 

The painted laurels wrong had set 
On thy unholy brow, would rot. 

24 



Truth lies well-deep in guileless eyes; 

Aflfections grace the dauntless heart; 
Trust sits enthroned in stainless soul ; 

And faith stands where the pathways part. 

Thus zestful life is one long road, 
All flower-bedecked, to simple mind 

That wisely craves no brighter dreams 
Than virtue's humble couch can find. 



25 



OH! WHY SHOULD THY HEART? 

Oh! why should thy heart wander forth from its 
nest 

In the warmth of thy maidenly bosom? 
It will find no retreat amongst all it loves best 

So fit for its budding and blossom. 

For where is the love that's so charming as thine, 
And where is the heart that could hold it? 

When the nightingale sang in the twining wood- 
bine, 
Not even his tongue could have told it. 

Like a rose, it would wither and die in the hand 
That ventured to pluck and transplant it ; 

On its own sweets it thrives, like the pine in the 
sand: 
Oh, would that my words might enchant it! 

But 'twill never for me burst its bonds in the 
light 

Of its sunny, angelic indulgence ; 
'Twill never for me fall awake in the night 

In dreams of unfathomed effulgence. 



NATURE'S SOLITUDK 

Bending o'er the stream, 

Where the waters flow — 
And my soul flows on with them 

Where sweet flowers grow ; 

Where the shadows lie 

On its shining breast — 
And my thoughts are mirrored, too, 

In its peaceful rest ; 

Nature's freshness spreads 

O'er the quiet scene — 
And my heart goes wandering 

Midst soft fancies green. 

Where the woods, crept down, 

Dressed in bridal leaf, 
Seek the water's loved caress ; 

Sadness' reign is brief. 

Birds of graceful wing, 

Fish of glinting hue, 
Vie in tranquilizing charm 

With my dreams of you. 



n 



THE OLD DAGUERREOTYPE. 

I was sitting alone in the firelight, 

In the silent and shadowy room, 
Where memories thronged through the darkness, 

And dead loves illumined the gloom ; 

When my eyes rested on a daguerreotype, 

Half-opened, reflecting the gleam 
Of the lambent flames lazily mounting. 

Lightly touching the face like a dream. 

And my mind drifted back to my boyhood, 

And the days of my earliest love ; 
And the face on the old table called me — 

Called me back to the old hemlock grove. 

There we met once again, in the spirit. 
Where sweet ecstasy erstwhile held sway; 

And she twined her fresh, young arms about me, 
And drove all my reason away. 

I dreamed till my old heart had softened 

In tears of long hopeless regret ; 
And I kneeled at the shrine of her likeness, 

And prayed for the strength to forget. 



28 



JENNIE. 

(A Song.) 

Oh, Jennie, my Jane ! 
My heart must remain 

Forever thine own, sweet love; 
Though fortune may change 
And plans disarrange, 

My love will still call in the grove. 

Oh! list to its sigh, 
Thou maid of brown eye ; 

Oh ! list to its longing for thee ! 
When rocking to rest 
On slumber's soft breast. 

Pray dream, ah, my dear one ! of me. 

Out in the grove it is calling to thee. 

Singing of thee, cr3nng for thee; 

Hark! O dear heart, how it's praying for thee! 

O wake love — 'tis dying for thee! 



JOHN MARSHALL. 

Out of the shadows of history, 

Loved lineaments of the great 
Gleaming now clear and now fitfully, 

The heart of young hope animate. 

Those who down to the grave went in glory, 

Shrouded in untarnished fame, 
Hallowed by genius' achievements 

Teach us the worth of a name. 

Greatness, when wedded to goodness, 
Bears offspring that never shall die, 

And, cherished in grateful approval. 
Hold no sad defects to our ej'e. 

Back in our country's beginnings, 

Threatened with annihilation. 
Silencing all opposition, 

Rose one who fought for the nation. 

Fought with the gun and the intellect — 
Soldier and statesman and jurist; 

And, like the unperishing day-star, 
The light of his mind still endureth. 

Swung in the censer of ages, 
The perfume of justice ascendeth 

Aye from his actions and wisdom, 
And will swing while the mind apprehendeth. 

Rich both in lore and in kindness, 
Each doubt new conceptions awoke 

In this mind that was supple to bending, 
Yet, bending, bore fruit ere it broke. 

30 



His the justice that punished not blindly, 
But with sweet, human mercy was tempered ; 

And so long as a wrong shall need righting 
Shall the depth of his thought be remembered. 

Thus- the reason, but what of that heart-blood 
That so ceaselessly throbbed for the free ; 

And who now may weigh the salvation 
He wrought then for you and for me? 

I know not what's writ on his tombstone. 
Where honor bloomed forth in his van ; 

But his works are a deathless memento 
Of John Marshall, the patriot and man. 



31 



BLANCHE AND ISABEL. 

Like red wine 'neath the moonlight 

And gold wine in the sun, 
Love's blushes on my Blanche's cheeks 

Up to her tresses run ; 

But Isabel is full as fair, 
And rarer tints betray her hair : 
What heart distraught between the two, 
Could e'er determine what to do? 

My Blanche's eyes are madd'ning. 

My Isabel's lips sweet ; 
And oft I doubt, in rapt despair, 

Which first my kiss should greet. 

O eyes of starry brilliancy 
And lips that shed their dew for me, 
My heart would to you both be true 
If I could but combine the two! 

To linger where love laughs 
And shun all mournful things, 

To drink where genius quaffs 
And soar on tireless wings ; 

Is but a poet's dream, 

That cannot, loves, compare 
With all the joys that seem 

To gather where you are. 



32 



ISABEL AND BLANCHE. 

Oh, could I tell you all I felt 
When at your two-fold shrine I knelt, 
The fairest words soulless would seem 
Beside the glory of my dream. 

For richer are your lips, your eyes, 
Than blood-red flowers 'neath deep blue skies; 
And, treasured in this heart of mine, 
Your blushes shame the rarest wine. 

Too late to choose, I wander yet 
Where memory's lost in fond regret ; 
As when the snow its mantle spreads 
Above the sleeping flowerets' heads. 

Oh, Isabel, sweet Isabel ! 
To know you's but to love you well ; 
And Blanche, no star of heavenly light 
Throws half your radiance by night ! 

My dearest hopes, my saddest sighs. 
Are measured by your fathomless eyes ; 
To live is prayer, to die were sweet, 
Kneeling or lying at your feet. 

O Isabel, O Blanche divine! 
Seek for no other love than mine; 
In you two virgin hearts I see 
Destined by holy heaven for me. 



33 



TRANSVAAL. 

Believest thou, in thine own secret soul, 

That thou art right to tempt the patient Boer 

To an unequal conflict, that his blood, 

Congealing in thy golden opportunity, 

May clot the avenues of human faith 

And set thy stamp of insincerity 

Indellibly upon his agony — 

Nor wife, nor child consider in thy heart? 

Baseless baubles thy ill-fraught excuses, 

Sown in lust and blossomed forth in crime, 

Dark as hell is, yet lighted by the flame 

Of mankind's condemnation — Coldly yet 

The iciness of thy absurd demands. 

In blasphemous, ignoring strike at heaven. 

Swells earth's eternal list of heaven-wept wrongs. 

Down in the land that seems by God forgotten. 

In thy insulting face has issued forth 

A cry impassionate from hearts that love 

And are loved, even as tenderly as thine own ; 

And, for shame, thou answerest not — Cursed 

By thy insatiate and insensate greed, 

Oblivion yawns for thy good intentions. 

And rank ingratitude is puffed 

With pride of armored might, and thunders 

Of vile opprobrium, on thy deaf ear, 

Are like the wistful whispering of the ant — 

Heard indeed, but heard alone of God- 



34 



Is money then the crown'ed king of hearts, 
That any brawny knave may hope to win 
Through perfidy personified as right, 
Yet wronging justice to its innermost core? 
Each kiss that mantles on the pallid lips 
Of babe and mother in that dreaded hour 
When Boers, as men, leave their sad homes be- 
hind, 
Shall speed to heaven as bullets fly ! 
And, though thou conquereth, the blood that 

stains 
Thy world-grasping hands will never out; 
And tarnished glory on belated wing 
Will fly sans object in a poisoned sky. 
And they who die to fat thee, greedy-gut, 
Fanatical as thou mayst wrongly deem 
Them in their virtuous, though puny, strength ; 
Shall rise again in deathless days to come 
So high above thy blinded, pigmy mind 
That they, in solemn pity, looking down 
From their sin-unapproachable far heights, 
Will drop their tears of chastened memory 
In sweet compassion on thy thankless soul. 



35 



THE DEATH OF THE LOBSTER. 

Ah ! noblest fish that ever svvain, 
Free and untrammeled in the sea, 

'Tis sacrilege that thou must die 
To give a fleeting joy to me. 

Thy mail'ed hand that hints of war, 
In fellowship is ne'er extended 

To meet the grasp of tyrant man, 
Who gloats o'er thee when life is ended. 

And yet thou gaineth in demise, 
Aye, quite as much as many a man 

Who on his death bed lies content 
To think that, dying now, he can 

Insure his loved ones affluence 

He could not hope for them while living ; 
And, soothed by his approaching rest, 

Feels all the blessedness of giving. 

And though in no uncertain stream 

His vanquished life may pass before him, 

For all the ease he leaves behind 
His tribe is certain to adore him. 

Thus thou, O lobster ! couldst thou think, 
Like thy more gifted human brother, 

Wouldst choose the death that maketh glad 
The mourner, over any other. 



36 




.'"X/^ 



BROILED LOBSTER. 

Great lobster ! were we served like you — 
Alive and squirming cut in two, 
And salted while our entrails quivered, 
Before our souls had been delivered ; 

How could sweet maidens, so demure, 
The dread, repulsive sight endure. 
And calmly sit and eat our livers 
And tear our dying hearts in slivers, 

To satiate their base appetite ; 
Or pass the trivial hours of night 
Drinking to our sad decease 
In glasses emptied to their lees? 

'Twere not so solemn to be boiled. 
But to be twained and broiled alive! 

Oh ! who would e'er a lobster be 
If he but knew how men connive 

For his untimely death to gloat 
Upon the softness of his flesh ; 

Nor e'en in mercy, cut his throat. 
But split his back while yet so fresh? 

'Twere vain a moral to attempt 
To patch the misery of my strain. 

Except dead lobsters taste so good ; 
While living lobsters breathe in vain. 



37 



MARJORIE. 

Light as the feather on thy hat, 
Thy airy smiles beguile me : 

The sweetest stream from nectar's vat 
Could touch but to defile thee. 

For love is sparkling in thine orb, 
Like starry passions gleaming 

In skies that every hue absorb 
That in that orb lies dreaming. 

Thy face, O heaven ! it is a sight 

To set the gods athinking! 
What ecstasy could hold the light 

To lips that, to thee drinking. 

Must faint with rapture in the draught, 
And, wet with blissful longing, 

Would hide their blush in subtle craft 
From cupids round thee thronging? 

'Tis heaven's own guerdon that thy charm 

Holds lightly still above us ; 
'Tis love indeed could hope to storm 

Those heights that madly move us. 



38 



NOR HEAVEN NOR HELL. 

Your arguments are vain; no man can tell 
Whether there is a heaven or a hell ; 
But any simple fool knows when he's sick, 
And that a sausage's softer than a brick. 
Leave to the wise the making of old saws, 
And, when you reach the unknown, think and 

pause. 
Unto your faithful belly e'er be kind. 
And in the long run you will surely find 
'Tis your best friend, when treated fairly well ; 
Whether there's a heaven or a hell. 



39 



LOVE LIVES FOREVER. 

When youth is drunk with love 
And age is drunk with wine, 

The little foxes steal the grapes 
That bend the tender vine. 

But youth will live to drink again 
When age has passed away, 

And many a heart that broken lies 
Shall mend on love's birthday. 

For love lives ever, though the heart 

May perish and be gone; 
For when the body turns to clay 

The heart but turns to stone; 

And, melted in the fire of time, 

Will turn to shining gold 
When from the sepulchre's decay 

By new-born hands 'tis rolled. 

Undiminishing and bright, love lives 
Through ages, floods and climes; 

Forever strung in sweet attune 
With God's immortal chimes. 

Then love to live and live to love, 
And, dying, love, and, born again, 

Awake to love ; and only love 
Shall satisfy thy longing then. 



40 



^^^^^w^rr~wEJ] 




TO A BABY'S FACE. 

I love to see the innocence 
On childhood's face enthroned, 

The wond'ring eye and trustfulness 
That here alone are found. 

Receptive to the slightest truth 
Their virgin minds are taught, 

Thrice cursed be he who wantonly 
Shall teach them there is naught 

That's sacred in this doubting world ; 

That cunning minds have learned, 
With growing age and wise conceit, 

That truth can e'er be turned 

To serve the ends of falsehood ; 

And that our bleeding hearts 
Are cured by idle sophistries. 

And honest feeling thwarts 

The friendship of the knowing ones— 
Oh! childhood's calm belief 

In those who first surround it, 
Is but too sadly brief. 

There is no wisdom vaunted 
By those whose eyes grow small 

From knowledge and experience. 
That can compare at all 

With that pure glance of heaven 

Seen in a baby's eyes — 
That unformed mind that wanders — 

Those innocent replies 

41 



To questions culled of verbiage 
So they may understand. 

They are the gods we worship — 
The never-ending band 

That pleads for us with heaven, 
And makes us live again 

The days we had forgotten 
Through days that yet remain. 

O childhood's sweet remembrance! 

Oh ! baby arms that twine 
About our necks and cherish 

That charity divine 

Which we had lost without them ! 

How dark our lives would be 
With no young faces round us — 

No new-born eyes to see 

The world as God has made it, 
The good in everything, 

The charm and beauty all but dead 
To us; the joys that bring 

The memories of our early lives 
To soothe our present sorrow, 

And in the dreams of yesterday 
Make us forget tomorrow. 

O baby faces innocent ! 

O baby eyes so mild ! 
O little hands that grope for ours, 

O childhood undefiled ! 



42 



Thou art the living promise 
Christ gives to us through thee ; 

In thee He's e'er arisen since 
He died on Calvary. 



43 



VERNA. 

Venerable fossil, doomed to lie 
Within the rock's cold breast, 

Called, centuries ago, to die ; 
Who first disturbed thy rest 

Gazed in amazement on thy form, 

Through ages lost to view : 
Ten thousand years of calm and storm 

Now call thee forth anew. 

What wonders couldst thou not unfold 

If Time untied thy tongue, 
What beauties didst thine eyes behold 

When this old world was young? 

Would lamps with wisdom seem to burn. 
If thou couldst hear our speech? 

Wouldst thou but now begin to learn. 
Or now begin to teach? 

Say ! tell us whom thou knewest great, 
To what gods bent the knee. 

What seas and lands bound man's estate, 
And was man slave or free? 

Was woman then, as she is now, 
At once man's friend and foe? 

Did glory on some youthful brow 
Imprint its quenchless glow? 

Good friend, take up the faded page 

Historians turn in vain, 
And read what's writ about the age 

That ne'er shall bloom again. 

44 



And when, with learning too replete, 
We drop our eyes in shame, 

Speak of thine own departed love. 
And whisper low her name. 

Had she, like Verna, hair of jet 
And eyes of matchless light. 

And didst thou all but her forget. 
And dream of her by night? 

Was she more beautiful, more sweet, 

Than Verna is to me? 
Had maids then charms no longer meet 

For maids of high degree? 

Thou answerest not; ah! well I knew 

Thou couldst no story tell 
Of any maid so dear and true 

As she I love so well. 

So to my Verna I'll return 

And linger all the day; 
And if my Psyche break her urn, 

I'll kiss her tears away. 



45 



THE BIRTH OF THE GRACES. 

In other days long since decayed, 
Prenatal days of long ago, 
Before the fields had been defloured 

Or forests low by vandals laid ; 

In the wild haunts of birds deceased 
And hunting grounds of wilder men, 
Where roamed strange beasts ere now defunct, 

Which lived on lesser beasts they seized ; 

When the hot sun-rays did descend 
Through mammoth trees' deciduous leaves, 
And monstrous snakes their prey decoyed 

With subtle charm to their dread end ; 

When rifted rocks the rage defied 
Of hurricanes and myriad winds, 
And oceans raved till they destroyed 

The cliffs that checked their rising tide; 

When hope was to all men denied 

Through the ingratitude of Eve, 

Who by her selfishness defamed 
The sex she might have deified : 

Sweet Charity, till then delayed, 
Was born of grief and punishment, 
When Cain and Abel earned desert 

Of woman's passion once betrayed. 

Then Faith, by heaven predesigned 
To take the place of hopelessness, 
But, till 'twas needed, long deferred, 

Was granted; that it might remind 

46 




t:t^War<SffgtSBfffS7gI8gS^?gSfBa»5!8raf^55«& 



The erring ones, in their despair, 
That happiness still lay beyond, 
And, as at first, it was derived 

From the great love that God did bear. 

Then cheering Hope, so long demised, 
Was born again — of Charity : 
And, men forgetting to despond, 

Faith, Hope and Charity were prized 

Above all things that did delight 
The mind and heart, and heal the soul ; 
And Wisdom's lamp, with them deluged, 

Blazed on the darkest hour of night. 

And thus through ages time declined 
With these few graces paramount. 
Till Christ was sent that the depraved 

In Mercy might a Savior find. 

Then Love, too gracious to describe, 

Became the heritage of man ; 

And made one more of God's demands 
That men in gratitude imbibe 

The spirit of Good Will declared 

In each unfolding of his plan ; 

So that these blessings be deserved, 
And men their vain regrets be spared. 

And so on other days depend 
The Graces of the days we know ; 
And through the days yet undescried 

They will continue to the end. 



47 



THE HEART CRY. 

I love thee ; oh ! dear heart, I love thee ! 
With all my pleading soul I love thee ! 
In every solemn hour of night 
Thy deathless memory I light 
Upon the altar of my heart : 
Thy precious voice I hear apart 
And over every sacred thing; 
Thy cadences my glory bring. 

Sweet friend of priceless happiness, 

H I had known thee not, or less, 

My famished heart had died in waking: 

Thy clinging love my heart in taking 

Hast lov'ed not alone, but best — 

Softly low, sweet murmurs rest ! 

Let me lie and dream of thee ; 

My solace, my heart's love, let me be I 



48 



THE BARN. 

Out in the barn. 

Under the hay, 
Up in the loft, 

Hidden away; 

Three little kittens. 
Gray, black and white. 

First opened their eyes 
In the shadowy light. 

Old mother cat, 

Leaving them there, 
Looked out the window, 

Walked down the stair. 

Out in the garden 

Basked in the sun ; 
Forgetting the kittens. 

Who, full of fun, 

Romped in the hayloft. 
Tumbling over and over; 

Longed to grow big 
And run out in the clover. 

As they grew older, 

And prettier too. 
Longed to go forth 

Where pastures were new ; 

Till once on a time, 

Half walking, half falling, 
They slid down the stairs 

While gay birds were calling 

49 



Out in the trees, 

Where the warm summer day 
Beckoned the kittens 

To come out and play. 

They breathed the sweet breath 
Of the fragrant sweet peas ; 

They found a sweet child, 
And climbed on his knees. 

He stroked their soft fur ; 

Looked down in their eyes, 
That blinked like the stars 

On the field of the skies. 

Day after day, 

In the soft summer weather, 
They played in the meadow 

And hid in the heather. 

They at last became cats 

And more serious grew. 
And the joys of their kit*enhood 

No longer knew. 

And the child grew in stature 

And wisdom and grace ; 
And the light of intelligence 

Lit up his face. 

But, with all that they gained, 
They had lost something greater, 

In the glamour of youth 
Which the All- Wise Creator 

50 



Had spread o'er the simple 
And innocent ways 

Of the kittens and child 
In their babyhood days. 



SI 



EDITH. 

Oh ! to be young ! to be beautiful ! 

To be grace itself personified 

And deified ; to walk the fields the peer 

Of vaunted Nature, charming the very air ! 

To throw the wealth of all love's deathless story 

In one impassioned glance ! To hold the eyes 

Of lovers till they backward turn for grief 

In parting from such enam'ring bliss withheld ! 

To smile — to smile sublimely, yet to smile 

Alone for me ! I'd make thee my heart's goddess ; 

There shouldst thou reign; and each untaught 

emotion 
In its subtle play upon thy face — 
That face of such exquisite workmanship, 
The handicraft of pulchritude exultant — 
Should show to me the living, mobile curving, 
The inimitable shades and colors. 
Of Nature's own untrammeled, artist hand ! 

And thy harmonious voice, clear and entrancing. 

Intoxicating as the trampled grape! 

Thy words like pearls dropped in a wine-steeped 

heart. 
Themselves filled with a melody divine ; 
Should sink within me, down, down, deep and 

deeper. 
Until the shadowy, faintly-dying echo 
Of their ecstatic presence in descent 
To love's unfathomed depths, should make for 

me 
A threnody of rapture undefined. 



52 



And, sweet, thy hair, that falls in kiss-mock locks 
In mad luxuriance on cheeks and temples 
Stained with love's enticing radiance ; 
And lips that part in ever changing lines 
O'er fresh surprises of thy dreamy teeth ; 
Oh ! if all this were made and meant for me, 
All other craved caresses I'd renounce 
For aye ; and would eternally foreswear 
Their blandishments and temptings eagerly 
For one sweet hour, infinitesimally short — 
And yet to me inimitably long — 
In rapt, forgetful blissfulness with thee, 

My Edith, love ; my love ! my more than love ! 
My passion-cherished queen ; my more than 

queen ! 
My goddess higher than a goddess throned ! 
My idol reared unbreakable, prophetic 
With dreams unspeakable, swift-coursing through 
The atmosphere impalable — soul fed — 
That holds the essence culled of infinite. 
Immaculate, transcendent adoration ! 



S3 



EVEN-TIDE. 

Let us meet where the gloaming 
Twixt day and night roaming, 
On the swallows fast homing 
Casts its shadows of rest. 

There's a balm that is dreaming, 
There's a charm that is teeming 
With the love that is gleaming 
In the eyes loved best ; 

That in solace descending 
On the day that is ending. 
Fill the heart with their blending 
Of sweetness and zest. 

How we pine o'er the waiting 
Through the slow hours belating 
The craved moments of mating 
That our beings infest ! 

And each night-light appearing, 
Glads the sight with the nearing 
Of the twilight endearing 
Pure affinity's quest. 

There the love that is living 
On the wealth of its giving, 
All its hoardings deliv'ring 
At affection's behest : 

Owns the soul that is yearning 
For the face that is turning 
Toward the heart that is burning 
With passion represt. 

54 



THE SUNSET. 

Oh I purple clouds of sunset sky, 

That hold God's glory to the eye, 

And murmuring winds with perfumed breath; 

Ye take the terror aye from death. 

In coming days with rapture filled. 
Our hearts shall feel what Heaven willed, 
That sweet oblivion born of joy 
And happiness without alloy. 

I would not live if I could die 
And be one color in the sky 
That spreads its beauty round the sun 
In grandeur when the day is done. 



55 



"ROSE." 

Oh! sweetest flower that ever grew 
In forest glen or pampered bed, 

With varying fragrance, ever new, 
Of every shade from white to red; 

God-mother to the new-born child, 
High priestess at the wedding shrine, 

Pure friend of sorrow — undefiled — 
Chief comforter in life's decline; 

Beloved of all, denied of none, 
From first to last of thy short span, 

A never emptied vial — one 

Perennial since the world began : 

Thou'rt but the emblem and the sign 
Of my sweet Rose, my love, my own ; 

Thy gorgeous blush, perfume divine. 
Her outward loveliness alone 

Portray: but she has other charms 
Thou knowst not, hid within her breast; 

Free from hot passion's swift alarms, 
Her heart's a sanctu'ry of rest. 

The pulse may madly beat, but still 
Her sweet repose removes its sting; 

Her presence lends its subtle will 
To conquer every wrongful thing. 

The floweret blooms but for the hour ; 

The heart that loves lives evermore, 
For thee, for me ; nor wealth nor power 

Can tempt it to forget its lore. 

56 



There is a peace whose sacred wings 
Are folded o'er the souls of men : 

Few reach it, though its solace brings 
To them all glories that have been. 

What yet may be in heaven gained 

We venture not to idly claim ; 
But if, now, every joy remained 

We could remember or love name, 

Who would, my Rose, try to disclose 
A field of flowers more sublime 

Than this expanse of all one knows 
Made lovely through the realms of Time? 

For treasures fade and flowers die; 

But love, when true, survives them all ; 
The sun, majestic, rides the sky. 

And mortals see its rise and fall : 

But thou, my sweet, my Rose, my dear. 
Art e'er the same, the world, to me ; 

I know no earth, no heaven, no bier. 
But where I'm sure thy love will be. 



57 



THE VIOLET. 

I smell the odor of the violet: 
Its fainting fragrance fills the summer air; 
Its purple glory holds my heart enthralled; 

Its early absence is my sad regret. 

Poor little lonely flower, that Heaven sent 
To minister to gentle, longing souls 
That breathe in pleasure with thy dainty scent ; 

Thou'rt heaven's wondrous bliss unto us lent. 

In nature's greening fields thou sweetly 
groweth, 
And car'st not for the careless winds that sway 
Thy pretty, graceful head from side to side: 

Full well thy lovely purity thou knoweth. 

I would I were a scented violet bright 
To give such dreamy pleasure aye to thee, 
Who idly hold my love in thy dear heart ; 

Then on thy bosom I'd be pinioned tight. 

There would I nestle in sublime content 
Until I drooped and faded in the warmth 
Of thy pure, thoughtless, virgin loveliness ; 

My head in unsung, ravishing worship bent. 

I cannot be a simple violet, 
Yet might I rest my head upon thy breast 
If only thou wouldst let me, heart of mine; 

But oh ! my love is unrequited yet, 



58 



GRANDFATHER'S HOUSE. 

Grandfather's house sits on the hill, 
With rough, unpainted window-sill, 
Outswinging blinds of faded green; 
And not a touch of art is seen 

In all its grim and homely shape ; 
Long windows on the garden gape 
In cruel ugliness of form, 
About which angry hornets swarm. 

The gate hangs by a single hinge ; 
The broken hedge that formed a fringe 
Of desolate and harsh despair 
About the yard, still lingers there. 

The orchard, with its stunted trees, 
That moan and tremble in the breeze, 
Singing its mournful dirge uncheckt 
Through branches dead, makes us reflect 

Upon the poverty of mind 
That never in this life could find 
A way to make it worth the living 
By some respect to beauty giving. 

Why should the appetite be fed. 
But art neglected till the dread 
Of innovation blinds the eye 
To e'en the beauty of the sky ? 

To toil is noble, but the heart 
Grows callous when the love of art 
Is buried in the furrowed ground, 
And all the glories that abound 

59 



In art and nature, are forgot 
In growing things to fill the pot. 
The soul that grovels in the dark, 
And never blazes from the spark 

Of beauty's fire or art's elation. 
Has been the type of every nation 
That perished surely, to make way 
For peoples of that brighter day 

Which dawns for all who will but learn 
That art and beauty, in their turn, 
Must e'er be cherished, that our toil 
May not upon our souls recoil. 



60 



AN EASTER MORNING SONG. 

Glory ! glory ! glory ! glory ! 

Glory to God in the highest ! 
Let all the saints in heaven descend; 
Let all the sinners on earth attend ; 
Let all the flowers in worship bend — 

For glory to God in the highest ! 

Mary ! Mary ! mother of Christ, 

Whom Easter deifieth : 
Look down on the loves that once have been ; 
Look down with thine eyes that once have seen 
Our Savior's life-blood stain the green — 

The blood that deifieth. 

Jesus, Savior, Lover, Friend, 

Whose mercy multiplieth ; 
Pleading for us at the judgment throne, 
Leaving us not in our fear alone, 
Suffering for us to atone 

For sin that multiplieth ; 

Raise us, teach us, lead us from 
The thought that Thee denieth ; 

Bind up our loins with the gospel's might, 

Be Thou our pillar of fire by night, 

Deliver us from the curseful blight 
Of soul that Thee denieth. 

Father, Son and Holy Ghost! 

Thy sanctity defieth. 
Every profane and vicious deed, 
Every disciple of pagan creed : 
Be Thou our present help in need 

When doubt our faith defieth. 
6l 



KARRA. 

With hands so soft and heart so kind, 
And graceful attributes of mind, 
Resplendent limbs and cheeks of dew; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

Your feet encased in fairy shells 
And laughter sweet as silver bells, 
But match your ears of pinkest hue; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

The stream no surer seeks the sea 
Than beckon all your charms to me: 
Oh ! may love teach me what to do ; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

The minutes into swift hours speed. 
And all the swift hours passion feed; 
Blest with thy love, my wants are few ; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

'Tis bliss to wait when you are late, 
And shake my playful doubts at Fate, 
Then reason out my faith anew ; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

'Neath brow so calm your sparkling eyes, 
Like twin stars lighting paradise, 
My spirit from its fastness woo ; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

Your lips like coral wreaths divine, 
Grow liquid to the touch of mine. 
And with their longing mine imbue ; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

62 



Not e'en in dreams may man behold 
Such tresses as your locks of gold 
With sunny love-lights streaming through ; 
My Karra, I'm in love with you. 

Were all my future to my view 
Disclosed, if it contained but you, 
From all repining I'd be free 
If, Karra, you were true to me. 



63 



We know as little as we know 
The soul's location — to and fro 
The crystals hurtle through the air 
In spectacle beyond compare. 

And we fain must be satisfied 
To watch the feathery atoms ride, 
With radiant beauty, on the storm, 
In all their varying grace of form. 



65 



TEMPUS FUGIT. 

The hour that's fled, 
The love that's dead, 

May never be again ; 
But memory, still, 
Their void shall fill 

With many a soft refrain. 

The crumbling mold 
Of loves untold, 

Oft lingers with us yet; 
And in our sleep 
We vigils keep 

When we fain would forget. 

For nothing's lost 
That ever cost 

The quivering eye a tear; 
And every joy 
Time would destroy, 

To memory still is dear. 



(£> 



BEAUTY'S EYES. 

(Dedicated to the painting of "The Bathers," 
by Bougereau, now in the Munger Memorial col- 
lection at the Chicago Art Institute.) 

Beauty's eyes enthrall me, 

And beauty's form divine 
Wakes all my sleeping passion : 

On beauty's lips recline 

Kisses sweet as nectar, 

Rich as ambrosia's balm, 
That rend my heart with longing; 

Yet steep my soul in calm. 

Beauty's arms so shapely 

Are white as winter's snow ; 
Their cooling touch in summer, 

The purest joy I know. 

Beauty's creamy shoulders 

Fair madden with the gleam 
Of their voluptuous splendors 

That with suggestion teem. 

Beauty's tempting bosom 

Fills me with strange desire, 
And wounds my eyes with pleasure; 

And makes my heart aspire 

To seek for further loveliness 

Below its swelling domes, 
And revel in the ecstasy 

That owns the eye that roams 

67 



About her waist so slender 
And thighs of wondrous grace 

That, tap'ring to her ankles, 
The line of beauty trace. 

Beauty's neck that rises 

So regally and strong 
Above the charms beneath it, 

Makes my rapt spirit long 

At her feet to worship 

In delirium entrancing, 
Ere I attempt the peril 

Of on her features glancing. 

Beauty's forehead's crown'ed 
With hair like Ophir's gold ; 

Her eyes like gems, in setting 
Of dreamy smiles unfold. 

When beauty's eyes adore me, 
And beauty's hands seek mine, 

And beauty's arms caress me. 
And beauty's gaze benign 

Looks in my spirit's mirror 
And sees her own reflection ; 

In beauty's eyes my heart lies 
Of its own fond election. 



68 



THE NEW CENTURY. 

Once in a hundred years there comes to pass 

An epoch when all old things pass away; 
Night passes on the burden to young dawn ; 
And all things erstwhile new became passe. 

Once in a hundred years man lives to tell 
That his poor eyes saw, through the rifted veil 

Of future's unrelinquished arts and charms, 
The greatness of the coming vast entail 

That passes from old centuries to new 
Once in a hundred years of man's estate ; 

And genius leads the army whose advance 
Treads down the weeds of ignorance, elate 

With new-born hopes and charity for none 
Who quibble o'er disparities of old ; 

The new horizon that attracts its gaze 
Is brighter far than you and I behold. 

Yet treasured in the heart of mortal man 
Are truths no future glories can destroy ; 

While science in fresh majesty unfolds, 
True love will linger still without alloy. 

How great the living seem beside the dead ! 

How small misfortune seems beside success ! 
Oh ! thinketh thou this century dawning fast 

Will make life's pains or pleasures seem the 
less? 

O thou who boldest worlds in thy hand ! 

Incline thine ear unto our humble prayer — 
Let knowledge and true brotherhood expand ; 

But keep our old love warm where e'er we are. 

69 



So that, a thousand milHon years from now, 
When man has lost his semblance to this race; 

Through all his swift advancement, and mis- 
takes, 
Thou still mayst trace Thy likeness on his face. 



7© 



MYRTLE. 

Sweet is the thought where you are the subject; 

Swallows at twilight fly swift to the nest; 
So flies my love when your kiss is its object; 

Soft on your bosom my longing heart rest! 

Dear are the moments to love dedicated; 

Dreary the absence of endearing charms ; 
Doubts gather thick when love's message's be- 
lated ; 

Dead lie those doubts when I lie in your arms. 

Ever the evening heralds the morrow ; 

Earliest dawn comes but after the night ; 
E'en so the angels their radiance borrow 

E'er from your dark eyes' luxuriant light. 

This is the song that my soul's ever singing, 
Twining its tendrils so closely and true, 

Touching the chords with love's melody ringing, 
Tenderly clinging, my Myrtle, to you. 



71 



THE ROSE OF BETHLEHEM. 
(A Christmas Poem.) 

Sweet rose of Bethlehem — enchanted flower, 
That, by the holy Christ-child's hand caressed, 

Didst turn thy bursting petals towards his face 
And rest thy blood-red glory on His breast ; 

Tell me ! didst thou know our Savior then, 
And feel the Heaven-born power in His touch? 

And didst thou tremble in thy every leaf 
And swell with florulent, fragrant joy that such 

Shouldst be thy Heaven-bless'ed privilege 
That, fondly dying in His baby hand, 

Thou couldst expire but to be born again, 
To bloom eternal in this ransomed land? 

The rosy light of stilly summer morns 
That filled with promise all the pale blue sky. 

Awoke thee but to daily-added charms 
Disclosed to thy quiescent flower eye. 

The slowly-creeping shades of twilight's gloom 
That hid the Christ-child from thy eager gaze, 

Didst serve alone to aid thy waning strength, 
To still sustain thy poignant, rapt amaze. 

Didst thou, sweet rose, behold by dreamy night 
The shepherd's star, with kindly, guiding glow, 

Beckon to the sleeping universe 
And light the way, that all who looked might 
know 

Where the anointed babe of God and Love 
Lay humbly sleeping in the manger rude. 

And Virgin Mary gently watched him in 
Her pure and heavenly beatitude? 

72 



Say ! didst thy pungent flower soul go out 
To meet the breaths from unknown, distant 
spheres, 

That whispered softly round his Christian form 
And told His message to thy flower ears? 

And didst thou shed thy silent, dewy tears 

At all the coming agony and loss, 
As, walking sunward with extended arms, 

His body threw the shadow of the cross? 

And wert thou, fair one, always ruby red ; 

Or is this roseate color which we see 
But one undying blush of burning shame 

For men's unjust and horrid cruelty? 

Christ, in His mortal grief and sympathy, 
Didst stain thee with His sacred heart's red 
blood, 
Made beautiful thy crimson ignominy 
And named thee, for His Heavenly Father, 
" Love." 



^2> 



POUR PASSER LE TEMPS. 
TO YOU: 

Ah ! dearest, when I think of you, my lips 
In vain portray your fascinating grace ; 

In vain my eyes endeavor to recall 
The ever-changing magic of your face. 

The charming poise of head, the sun-kissed hair, 

Heavy with its burden of despair 
To cast aside conventional restraint 

And hide your shoulders, passionately bare ; 

Your shelly ears that peep so temptingly 
Through tresses damp with beauty's curling 
kiss, 

And dimples like the fruit of paradise 
Ineffably hung on the bough of bliss ; 

Your eyes that speak the language of the heart 
More eloquently than the poet's lyre. 

Your form evading every surmise — 
Half lost and half revealed through scant at- 
tire; 

Your arms that in their sinuous lines embrace 
Youth, art and symmetry, commingled there 

With tints that baffle artists' futile skill- 
Quick pulsing, yet so cool and debonair; 

Your bosom nestling tempestuous delights 
Untasted, that with turmoil fill the mind ; 

Your tout ensemble, faultless and unique: 
All these in rare profusion do I find. 



74 



But, dearest, 'tis not why I love you so — 
This outward, eye-enslaving comeliness; 

But deeper lies the magnet that attracts. 
And makes my heart its love for you confess. 

'Tis in your kindly ways and tender soul 
And sweet, confiding air, I find my joy: 

These are the real beatitude to which 
Your beauty's but the ravishing decoy. 



75 



EASTER. 

Glory! glory! Christ has risen, 
Bearing on His sacred breast 

All the weary, woe-begotten 
Souls that vainly covet rest; 

Bearing in His tortured hands 
Lamps of love, illuminating 

Darkest recesses of doubt, 
Malignity's designs frustrating; 

Bearing on His bleeding feet 
Kisses of the pure in heart, 

Tears of agony immortal, 

Bruises from the stony mart; 

Lifting on His thorn'ed head 
Halos of the myriad true, 

Chaste and gentle imitators 
Whom He taught His mercy to; 

In His sacerdotal garments, 

Wafting infants innocent. 
With their trusting eyes in worship 

On His shining features bent. 

Twine the flowers in transportation ! 
Harp the paeans of adoration ! 
Bend the knee to revelation 
Of the Lord's transfiguration ! 



ye 



CHILDHOOD'S CHARM. 

Childhood, ever fresh and fair, 
Interesting, debonair, 
Tell me, teach me, what you are. 
That such comfort brings. 

In the March wind, pleasure-sped. 
Ruddy cheeks and towsled head. 
Heavenward by angels led. 
For you curfew rings. 

Sweet your voices, soft your hands. 
New-born from immortal lands, 
Sifting out life's freshest sands 
On our longing hearts. 

Pleading are your verdant glances ; 
Love your youthful bloom enhances ; 
Free to choose from fortune's chances 
For important parts. 

Be you e'er what to our fancy 
Nature makes the spring-time pansy, 
Pure and lovely to behold 
To our eyes fast growing old. 

Twine about our souls' gray rocks, 
While your laugh our worry mocks ; 
In your charm we dance again 
To joy's long forgotten strain. 



17 



FELICITY. 

Come ! let us linger where the woodbine twineth, 
Come ! let us kiss where the moonbeams stray ; 

Night is the time when the love-rod divineth, 
Day-time was made but for children to play. 

Give me thy hand, thy heart and thy bosom ; 

Red lips and pale cheeks lay on mine : 
Where in the world is the love-tinted blossom 

That can intoxicate like love like thine? 

Fondle me ! Pet me ! Place your hand where 
my heart is ; 

Heart-beat to heart-beat, listen to the throb; 
In delirious abandon, forget where thy arm is ; 

Press me ! embrace me, close till I sob ! 

Ne'er could I tire of thy fierce adoration ; 

Kisses of thine burn like fire on my neck ; 
Thou hast my love — in thy passion's exploration 

Take my whole being, and with kisses bedeck! 

I love thee ! I love thee ! kiss me over again, love ! 

Heav'n has no charms these moments could 
shame ; 
Hold now my tired head on thy heart, love; 

Whisper with perfumed breath my name. 

Ah ! if in such sweet embrace we might rest, dear, 
Night never giving place to the day, 

With none to observe by the blind stars above, 
dear; 
Who would still further rapture essay? 



78 



DECORATION DAY. 

Black night holds back the struggling rays 

Of dawn incipient, as in days 

Of no sad import — Nature knows 

No difference ; nor, partial, shows 

A pleasanter or gloomier face. 

The mounting lights the shades efface 

That guard the graves through silent hour- 

The graves that built a nation's power. 

Rose-tinted clouds nor skies of gray 
Can rob the glory from the fray ; 
Nor strike one laurel from the head, 
Where lie the country's honored dead. 
Though nature through a thousand years 
May make and unmake, and appears 
To be omnipotent, she can 
In no way change one noble man. 

The ground-mist from the dewy grass 
May rise, to fade in golden mass 
Against the sun's ascending ball, 
Or, rain-depressed, spread like a pall 
Upon each love-compelling grave ; 
But not one branch may idly wave 
Aside the sacrifice and care 
That with the brave are buried there. 



19 



The memories that, in countless throng, 
Proclaim the day, and faith prolong, 
And fill the heart with gratitude 
Approaching pure beatitude ; 
Are undisturbed by budding leaf 
By nature's smiles or nature's grief : 
Nor wind nor calm, sunlight nor gloom, 
Can dwarf the grandeur of the tomb. 

Here lies the buried love, enshrined 
Indelibly in every mind. 
While nature sleeps, or wakes in awe 
To find one thing that to her law 
Is unamenable — the heart — 
Bleeds on, and, in its realm apart, 
Emblazons and irradiates 
The idols that it animates. 



THE CHRISTMAS TREE. 

Little eyes so swift awakened ; 

Little hands so quickly filled; 
Little arms so fully laden ; 

Little hearts so sweetly thrilled! 

Lit by fairy lamps' soft glimmer, 
Angels step by step descend 

Through the trees* mysterious branches, 
That with love's new burdens bend. 

Christ is born again at Christmas 

In each heart of little one; 
And the wonders of his coming 

Glorified through ages run. 



8i 



MARY. 

I would I were the wings of Love, 

To beat the breath of heaven against thy 
heart ; 
And waft thee from below above, 

Dear Mary, earthly idol that thou art. 

The radiant gifts of all the gods 

I'd lay in lavish glory at thy feet ; 
Oh, sweet belov'ed, slumber nods 

Divinely beautiful in thy retreat : 

In thy retreat, that sacred spot 
Where loveliness holds undisputed sway; 

Where each discordant thing is not. 
And beauty charms the darkest care away. 

'Tis there I'd linger while the lark 
Filled with clear melody the azure sky; 

'Tis there on dream ships I'd embark, 
I'd love thee, and I'd lay me down to die. 



82 



MY LITTLE BOY AND I. 

My little boy and I have fun 
Shooting "injuns" with his gun; 
Drumming up his tin recruits 
To his martial trumpet toots. 

Then we kick his football high 
As the eagle in the sky; 
Roll the marbles, spin the top, 
Till we're tuckered out and drop. 

Then we play I am his horse, 
Bound "like sixty" round the course. 
While his woolly doggies bark 
With excitement at our lark. 

So we romp until his eyes 
Droop in sleepy, blue surprise; 
And I lay his tired form 
In his bed all snug and warm. 

Soon he'll grow too big to play — 
Put the broken toys away — 
But, whate'er his future be, 
He will find a friend in me. 



83 



BATTLE HYMN OF HUMANITY. 

(Air: "John Brown's Body.") 
The truth is lying naked in the cradle of the 

heart ; 
It will rise, all clothed in glory, when the good 

and evil part; 
And God shall drive the traders from misrule's 
unholy mart ; 
And bid the fallen rise. 

Chorus : 

Jesus loves you and will save you ; 
Keep the promise that He gave you; 
In the healing waters lave you ; 
When all the fallen rise! 

Mine ears have heard the crying of the children 

of the night ; 
They are longing for the coming of abundance's 

kindly light ; 
Oh! pitying hands be generous, oh! gentle 

smiles be bright ; 
And help the fallen rise ! 

The sun that gilds the morning with its joys for 

one or two, 
Is prophetic but with punishment for others, just 

as true. 
Who only ask for honest work for willing hands 

to do; 
That they may, fallen, rise. 



84 



From the hovel and the palace, from the brothel 

and the pew, 
There are silent prayers ascending, from the 

faithful and the few ; 
To the fount of love and mercy flowing hope for 

me — for you : 
We shall, though fallen, rise. 

Here's a heart and hand for charity, a blessing 

for the poor, 
A staff for all the weary, and the message sweet 

and sure : — 
"The Lord will save His people from the wicked 

and the dour." 
Let all the fallen rise. 

We will fight tlie human battle knowing that our 

God is nigh, 
Watching over us in agony with Jesus in the sky; 
And the angels are recording every prayer and 

every sigh 
On which the fallen rise. 



85 



WHY DO YOU WAIT? 

The shadows creep, 
The willows weep, 

O'er mankind's discontent: 
While mortals sleep 
The silent deep 

To misery seems lent — 
Why do you wait? 

The heart that grieves, 
Unconscious weaves 

The fabric of its shroud; 
And fading leaves. 
Like lost reprieves. 

Are crying death aloud — 
Why do you wait? 

The tender ties. 
The longing eyes, 

That break in tears so vain ; 
Are but the sighs 
Time multiplies. 

And die to live again — 
Why do you wait? 

Oh ! heart that beats 
In sad retreats 
For all that might be yours, — 
Your hunger eats 
The sacred meats 
Whose memory endures — 
Why do you wait? 



86 



Let sadness wane 
To glad refrain ; 

Forget that life is old ; 
Be young again, 
And young remain 

Till all of love is told — 
Why do you wait? 

Come blossoms sweet 
The gaze to greet 

On every tree that grows; 
And branches meet 
Where willing feet 

Keep step with nature's throes- 
Why do you wait? 

Then why repine ; 
Or still decline 

To feel the charm that holds. 
Like sparkling wine, 
The breath divine 

In all that life unfolds? 
Why do you wait? 



87 



OLIVE. 

Beneath far Greece's Olympian skies 

Drest in eternal blue ; 
My Olive lies with wistful eyes 

That shame their deepest hue. 

And as our bark drifts idly long 

On wings of passing wind. 
Her parted lips in silent song 

Pray to the god that's blind. 

It is enough, more than enough, 

To feel her presence near ; 
Thrilled by each jealous wave's rebuff 

Our passion grows more dear. 

Here, all alone with nature's god, 

We rest in sweet communion ; 
No magistrate's, nor priestly nod 

Need sanction our heart's union. 

O Olive ! richest, rarest gem, 

If Cupid wore a crown 
With loves begemmed, not one of them 

Could dazzle like your own. 

Blown on the south wind's lang'rous breath 

Your golden ringlets trace 
Love-lines that court a ling'ring death 

In beauty on your face. 

How dear the land where Homer died ! 

How bright its flowers grow ; 
Fair Helen in her queenly pride 

Made brows with valor glow. 



Yet there is not in mem'ry's chain 

A link so rarely wrought 
As young affection's fond refrain 

In fleeting visions caught. 

When darkness slowly wraps your smiles 
In bright remembrance's shroud, 

The waves beat on the sleeping isles 
And call your name aloud. 



So 



COME, FAME! 

O greatnees ! — God ! How canst thou hold it back 

from me? 
Ah ! Morpheus, god of sleep ! — those dreams ! and 

are they vain? 
Must they be given me but to be swift denied, 
Chimerical and void, when the all-leveling beams 
Of sunrise break the ephemeral bonds of night's 

blest visions, 
That hold the humblest brain enthralled, and 

clothe with rich 
Ambition's purple, for the nonce, the grief-bowed 

heart ? 
Let us treasure us as children do the shells 
Of pebbly, wave-swept beaches — valueless except 
To the undoubting eyes of youth that traffic not 
In cost or profit, but see and believe unbought — 
Those moments of sublime, unsought delight in 

which 
Thy slumber compensates us for all earthly ills. 
Oh, angels kneeling at the throne of brightest 

Heaven ! 
There is — there can be — no sweet incense offered 

up. 
And carried on thy shadowy wings of starry 

night ; 
So purely fragrant and acceptable to God 
As is the worship of the wounded heart, sleep- 
healed. 
That thus in black oblivion sees the sacred light 
That burns alone in dreams at night. And slow- 
ly from 
The threads of memory that escape night's mystic 
realm 

90 



To stay with me in the day's thought-enslaving 

light, 
Lord! Let my mind — grea* only in its love of 

truth, 
And beauty's voiceful charms of sound and form 

and color — 
Weave, in those patterns patent to the simplest 

one, 
The indestructible fabric of immortal fame I 



91 



MUSIC. 
(Air: " Verlegenheit" ; by Franz Abt.) 

Why doth the heart expand when music 

Is wafted low through trembHng air ? 
Where lies its charm — infatuation — 

For every mind that worships there? 
I know not the reason, 
I seek not the rule ; 

My heart and mind too replete 
With sweet agony 
That rolls over me 

And leaves me no base retreat. 

The heart that crieth from its deepness; 

The soul that mounteth, image-free, 
In every tone of voice and instrument : 

Oh ! would that heart and soul might be 
Forever bound up 
In pure harmony, 

With symphony wander distraught: 
All earth be forgot; 
Pain remembered not ; 

On wings of the angels caught. 



02 



LOVE'S THREE DEGREES. 

Thine the words that live forever, 
Fairest fruit of thine endeavor; 
In the vast future they shall be 
Belov'ed of posterity. 

Thine the thoughts that never die, 
But with true genius multiply; 
Oh, may they strike, while they endure. 
The chords of heaven's overture ! 

Thine the heart that lingers still 
Where the poet drinks his fill 
Of that nectar, softly flowing, 
That imparts sweet fancies glowing. 

Thine the eye that plainly sees 
Love has many fond degrees : 
One is lavished on the pet ; 
Still another, fonder yet. 

Breathes in the atmosphere 
Of the friends that hold us dear : 
But fondest still, if that may be, 
Is the heart-love I bear for thee. 

Mine the art to tell in rhyme 
Stories of the olden time, 
And the stories of today; 
But my pen can never say 

Words of passion half so strong 
As the words that do belong 
To the dreams that oft possess me 
When thy love comes to refresh me. 

93 



Mine the province to adore thee ; 
Thine the dear love watching o'er me ; 
Thine and mine the hearts alone 
That love's three degrees have known 

In their full and free perfection, 
Hallowed by fond recollection : 
Fate shall never — man cannot — 
Rob us of the tranquil thought. 



94 



HAST EVER BEEN IN HEAVEN? 

O shade ! hast ever been in heaven, 
And wandered, lost, among the blest; 

Blind with the myriad astral lights 
Of souls immortalized to rest? 

And didst thou find my lover there — 
The dear heart, wed alone to mine — 

Thrust high above the holiest, 
Close on the glowing throne divine? 

Didst not? Then thou must surely not 
Have ever passed the portals, wild 

With agonizing spirits, tossed 
Upon the sea of the defiled 

That 'tempt to force the gates of Heaven; 

Or glare with sear'ed eye-balls in. 
When angels throw them wide to greet 

Some soul repentant of its sin. 

Or, stay ! perchance her countenance 

Emitted such effulgent rays, 
Not e'en the angels might discern 

Her presence, with omniscient gaze. 

The measureless ecstasy of Heaven 

Through all eternity, implies 
Incalculably less to me 

Than one glance from her loving eyes. 

I'd seek her if my soul must rise 
So far above the throne of grace. 

That hell would nearer seem to God 
Than would the altitudes I'd trace. 

95 



And for one caress of her lips, 

I'd let my nameless being fall 
Down through such uttermost, dread depths, 

As would infinity appall ! 



06 



ANNA. 

When care departs on the silent wings 
Of sweet forgetfuhiess slumber brings, 
Lulled by the spell of night's solemn thrill, 
Memory fondles your sweetness still. 

Where, oh ! where is the heart that would 
Not languish uncomforted but for you? 

Luring 3'our soul from its balmy sleep 
Under the eaves where the raindrops weep; 
Drawing your love from your heart to me ; 
Stronger than space may my magic be. 

'Tis but a little I ask of you, but 
Oh, it is heaven and more to me I 

Beauty was born on your natal morn; 
Venus appeared like a maid forlorn ; 
Shamed by your grandeur, the radiant day. 
Blushing in sunset, declined away : 

All the stars hid their light in timid 
Worship of your love-anointed eyes. 

Manna of passion, so long besought, 
Madonna of hearts, in love's meshes caught; 
Yield all your charms to my fond embrace; 
There every record of time efface. 

Tenderly linger with me through all 
Eternity, spurning the suits of gods. 



97 



LISTEN! 

Peep, peep, peep ! 
The little chickens cry, 

Warm beneath their mother's breast, 
Safe beneath her eye. 

Bow, wow, wow ! 
The little puppies yelp ; 

Sure that, if they're only brave, 
Mother's there to help. 

Meouw, meouw, meouw! 
The little kitties go. 

While old pussy waves her tail 
Firmly to and fro. 

Chirp, chirp, chirp! 
The birdies in their nest. 

Softly call the mother-bird 
To her swinging rest. 

Ma, ma, ma ! 
The babies' voices call ; 

Music sweet to hearts that beat 
Tenderest of all. 



98 



LOOKING IN AT THE WINDOW. 

Looking in at the window of affluence, 
On pleasures that we are denied, 

There are faces on faces that join us. 
Which long have been strangers to pride. 

Oh! ye longings with jealousy pregnant, 
Oh ! beautiful dreams of the night — 

Poor blossoms that fade with the morning, 
To bask in eternity's light — 

I love you, though scented with poison; 

I love you, though bitter as gall ; 
And the light of the ages shall soften 

The pangs of regret for us all. 



99 



RUTH. 

When beauty smiles, all eyes behold 
Her rock of promise turn to gold ; 
Her lips, when smitten with a kiss, 
Breathe forth love's silver streams of bliss. 

Such smiles, such voices, have for all. 
From cradle to the silent pall, 
A charm that's never been gainsaid 
Since Cupid watched by lover's bed. 

And all these gifts are thine, my Ruth; 
In thee art's wedded fast to truth ; 
While nature spreads her flowers neat 
To dust with pensile leaves thy feet. 

The very dew, with sparkling eyes, 
Cries love to thee, and fainting lies 
To languish for thy melting glance, 
When night birds herald thy advance. 

The stars make lover's eyes at thee; 
The zephyr whispers to the tree 
That he has tossed thy hair in glee, 
Like black waves on a whitened sea. 

Whom seekest thou among the ruins- 
Of Cupid's edifices? Moons 
Have pushed aside their clouds in vain 
To spy thee, time and time again. 

Where nothing on the surface shows 
Who looks beneath to find a rose? 
So secretly thy true love's hidden 
Not e'en the angels there are bidden. 

100 



Upon that pure yet heaving breast, 
How sweet 'twould be to lie and rest, 
While thy breath fanned me ; could it be, 
My heaven I'd give for hell with thee ! 

But no man knows, nor yet do I, 
What thoughts within thee multiply; 
Nor whether I am first or last : 
Ah ! would the agony were past ! 

One look, one word — though half unheard- 
Would break my heart, or make the bird 
High-winging in a cloudless sky. 
Not half so close to heaven as L 

Some day, when time has sifted through 
His sieve the hearts both false and true, 
And weighed in his unerring scale 
The love that wins, the loves that fail ; 

I'll pillow yet these locks of mine 
Upon thy bosom so divine, 
And kiss those lips that all have craved, 
O'er which the gods and men have raved. 



lOI 



THE SILVER BELL. 
(A Card Party Idyl.) 

This silver bell, by chance or science, 

To some successful lady's lot 
Shall fall ; may cruel fate's reliance 

Upon her choice be questioned not. 

For fools may play with heavenly fire 
In safety, where the wise are burned; 

And she who wins this idle trophy 
Depends upon the cards she turned. 

And cards are fickle as Dan Cupid 

Who slights the great, the bright, the true, 

To lay his wealth before another, 
Who with sweet hopes had naught to do. 

The bell rings clear — you've but to try it; 

And art shall live in its design : 
Oh, gentle heart that strove and won it, 

It rings the comrad'rie in mine. 

So take my treasure ; nor return it 
Till long forgot the friendship be 

That tinkles in its every motion, 
When calling back my memory. 



102 



MARGUERITE. 

Could other bards have told your charms? 

Could other lips taste half so sweet? 
I trow not ; for no other bard 

Could love you so, my Marguerite. 

This heart of mine, with fire divine, 
Had burned in solitude for you. 

Long ere your eyes, in coy surprise. 
Invited me to dare and do. 

I'll ne'er forget — I tremble yet — 
When, glory in your face enshrined, 

I wandered through that heavenly gate 
No other eyes than mine divined. 

'Neath lips as pure and smile demure 
As angels' in a shepherd's dream, 

My heart reclined; in you to find, 
And lave in, love's refulgent stream. 



103 



WHEN THE EVENING FADES AWAY. 

When the hush is on the forest, 

And the moonlight coldly lies 
On the field's transfiguration ; 

Love is nestling in thine eyes. 

White with passion swells thy bosom ; 

Red with love-light burns thy brow ; 
Blue with glory beam thy true eyes 

Through their shadow-lashes now. 

Hark! the nightingale is singing 

To thy heart as to his mate ; 
All the starry hosts are winging — 

Only mortal love is late 

Panting to thy bower I hasten, 

Mad with nearing ecstasy , 
Twined within thy arms so am'rous, 

What can Heaven hold for me? 

Loving, hesitate the minutes, 

Ling'ring, loath to part from thee ; 

Crowding close on one another, 
Each eternity would be. 

Wrapt in enervating visions, 

'Neath thy siren eyes I lay 
All my heart, drained through thy lips, love, 

When the evening fades away. 



104 



ODE ON A LADY'S HAT. 

I'm writing on a lady's hat; 

But the pretty face below it 
Attracts my gaze : in pure amaze, 

I glance and do not know it. 

Its shade is purple, and the lines 
Of grace flow clear around it — 

I mean the hat and not the face — 
I've lost my head, confound it! 

The color comes and swiftly goes; 

There's wealth of meaning in it — 
Oh, pshaw ! It is her face I mean— 

I wish I'd never seen it! 

For, oh ! that hat's an artist's dream ; 

No fashion can outdo it ; 
But God's hands' moulded her sweet face ; 

I've lost my heart unto it! 



105 



THE FADED WREATH. 

The wreath has faded on my brow, 

My heart has fallen low ; 
And none but love can help me now : 

As sunset on the snow 

One moment colors to delight, 

Then melts its life away, 
Till bare it lays earth's homely breast — 

Shamed in its cold decay; 

So fame deceives while it allures, 

Till, in its swift decline, 
It leaves the barren heart, for love 

To soften and refine. 

Not like the spring's perennial bloom. 

May my renown return ; 
The altars of the gods, once quenched, 

New incense ne'er may burn. 

And greatness is a fickle god, 

Who loves to beckon all ; 
No idol ever reared of man 

Was sacred from its fall. 

There are no laurels hung so high 

That genius does not dare ; 
There are no depths so sunk below 

But what to some seem fair. 

Then what to me be the degree 

Of glory or of shame, 
If only in your eyes I read 

The worship of my name? 

ie6 



For love is greater than regret, 
And fame may stand alone ; 

If only by your side I sit 
And know you all mine own. 



107 



CECELIA. 

With sunsets in her hair 

And heaven in her eyes, 
More fragrant than the rarest rose ; 

My sweet Ceceha vies 

With every maid or nymph 
That ever queened the heart, 

Or wandered through enchanted wood 
To hide where lovers part. 

Arrayed in purest white, 

With rapt, unclouded brow, 
With lily's grace and beaming face ; 

She comes to meet me now. 

If I had all the gold 

Of Ophir in my grasp, 
'Twould fall unnoticed from my hands 

So I her form might clasp. 

She loves- me not enough, 

Though none could love me more ; 
Low, buried 'neath a million dead, 

I'd come back to adore 

The very air she breathed, 

The blushes on her cheek ; 
And from her lips to finger tips 

Her ravishment I'd seek. 

Alone beneath the stars, 

I've worn my heart away 
In hopeless search for deathless words 

In which my love to say. 
io8 



But words do not suffice 
To paint the flower's hue; 

My reason trips upon her lips, 
In spite of all I do. 



109 



CONTRASTS. 

The blue of the violet, red of the rose, 
Both bathe in sweet fragrance each zephyr that 
blows. 

The violet's simple, the rose more complex, 
But the bloom of the twain nature's bosom be- 
decks. 

How pleasant the hour spent with either one by, 
Whilst its scent lends its rapture to charm for the 
eye. 

Wouldst love best a violet — roses strewn there ; 
Or, with roses so near, are not violets rare? 



LOOKING BACKWARDS. 

When my heart shall gather aftermath, 
And my soul shall backward glance, 

Thy sweet face shall light my misty path 
And all my memories enhance. 

Through the mirrored charms of childhood's days 

And forgotten dreams of youth, 
While my mind in naive fondness sways, 

Commingling rhapsodies with truth; 

Still thy face shall be my silent guide: 

Where the stream of sorrow flows, 
O'er each drifting pang upon the tide 

Of memory, shall bloom a rose. 

And the buried pleasures that I meet 

On my dreamy pilgrimage, 
Straying where erstwhile thy loving feet 

Have lightly trod, shall grief assuage. 

And the bells of memory shall ring 

Low o'er each remembered scene; 
While thy tears their sunny showers bring, 

To keep fond recollection green. 



Ill 



MILDRED. 

With cupid's arrows in thine eyes, 
His bow strung in thy heart, 

A doughty warrior art thou 
As ever played the part. 

At early eve thou fareth forth 

In all thy brave array, 
And, charmed by thy appearance, men 

Forget to run away. 

Oh ! maiden fair, thou shouldst beware ; 

All arrows speed not true; 
Some dart my prove a boomerang, 

And slay the one who slew. 

Alas ; then all the myriad pangs 
That thou hast sent to roam. 

Will, multiplied a hundred-fold, 
To thine own heart come home. 

And love will rankle in thy breast 

More venomous than hate ; 
Then why, my Mildred, still invite 

Such irony of Fate? 

Wouldst thou not better love but one, 

E'en were that one but I ? 
If all thy wand'ring fancies blent, 

How sweet thy love could sigh ! 

My arms thy stronghold and retreat, 

My faith thy guiding star, 
No echo from the guilty past 

Thy gentle peace should mar. 

112 



THE SEA. 

Tumultuous swell of mysterious ocean, 
Passionate froth of the merciless sea, 

Lashed in a fury of life-hating motion ; 
Cast not thy death-luring spell over me. 

Fathomless depths of dark, heart-chilling water, 
Treacherous sparkle of picturesque wave, 

Drive not my boat to its wantonly slaughter, 
Rear not thy billowy foam for my grave. 

Dread are the secrets thou never unfoldeth. 
Cruel the clasp of thine engulfing arms ; 

Down in thy sleepless abandon thou holdeth 
Slow-rotting fruits of the tempest's alarms. 

Lap not my feet with thy servile encroaching; 

Kiss not my face with thy sun-glinted spray ; 
Take back thy smiles, familiarity broaching; 

Monster! thy untamed hypocrisy stay! 

Fatal to hope are thy rhythmical ripples; 

Faithless thy promise of deceiving calm; 
Falsehood the worth of thy messages cripples; 

Evil-intending thy soul-soothing balm. 

Borne on thy smooth-running crests, brightly 
breaking, 

Harmless thy whitecaps careen in the sun; 
Only to hold, and conceal in the making. 

Pitiless fate for each credulous one. 

Cold is the gleam of thy emerald furor ; 

Heartless the toss of thy crystalline head; 
Terror-reflecting thy green, greedy mirror 

Blurred with the tears of uncountable dead. 

"3 



Prayers temper not thy swift insatiation; 

Ceaseless, remorseless, thou seekest thy prey ; 
Bloodless thou quencheth their glad animation : 

Lost in thy measureless darkness they stay. 

Tempt not my eye with thy radiant graces ; 

Charm not my ear with thine entrancing song; 
Thrill not my heart with thy varying faces ; 

Rave o'er thy dead through the centuries long! 

Drear is the gloom of thy endless expanses ; 

Doleful the wail of thy wandering winds ; 
Mournful the dirge of thy drowned, that en- 
hances 

Weird deceptions that torture our minds. 

Never forgiving and never forgetting, 
Some fiend incarnate possesses thy soul ; 

Cursed with the stain of its murderous setting, 
Ever, forever, relentlessly roll ! 



114 



CARRIE. 

I send thee this flower to die on thy heart, 
As die all my pleasures when we are apart : 
If time were not lagging and distance so long, 
My lips should shed kisses in place of their song. 

For, waking or sleeping, I think but of thee ; 

My body is chained, but my spirit is free; 

And the miles that between us their dreary 

lengths trace, 
The feet of my wandering fancy efface. 

Come ! meet me in chaos, where none may define 
Our relative status — earthly or divine — 
Where we may commingle our two souls in one. 
And, together, fly back where Love's rule was 
begun. 

In a beautiful bower built of lovers' soft sighs. 
All begemm'ed with jewels of lovers' fond eyes, 
While millions of loving hearts vigilance keep. 
The voice of the ages shall sing us to sleep. 

And, Carrie, we'll sleep till the blush of that day 
When the walls of eternity, melting away. 
Disclose to our waking eyes treasures so bright. 
That the glory of heav'n will seem darker than 
night. 



"5 



TO A FACE BEHIND A FAN. 

(A Fragment.) 

Immortal God that holds the skies 
Just one brief grasp beyond our eyes, 
And makes a face still half-concealed 
More poignant than the charm revealed; 

Possess me of thy nameless power 
That paints the glory of the flower, 
And help me find, beneath its mask, 
The true soul, laboring at its task. 

In beauty unknown value lies — 
More priceless are the velvet eyes 
That linger fondly in the thought, 
Than all the wisdom ages taught. 

Why tremble when the heart is grieved 
With dread misfortunes unrelieved? 
Forever beauty's tear-wet eye 
Cries shame upon the unborn sigh. 



ii6 



HER WEDDING NIGHT. 

O the red blood seeks her damask cheeks 

As the orange blossoms He 
On her hair of gold, so softly rolled 

Above her beaming eye ! 

And her lips are sweet to lips they meet 

In welcome and good-bye ; 
But the stars of old gleam far and cold, 

And a new love lights her sky. 

To her chosen mate — her untried fate — 

Her smiles no fears betray : 
All the night before, with close-latched door. 

She kneeled to cry and pray. 

What man who sleeps while virtue weeps', 

Can know a maiden's shame 
When she gives away 'twixt night and day 

The vestige of her name? 

From home of wealth, or rustic health — 

Which, matters not the least — 
So soon to go for weal or woe, 

Makes sad the wedding feast. 

Through portals lit by friendly wit. 

She passes to the night. 
Whose waiting shades fall round to aid 

And hide her blushing flight. 

There, spent between doubts sere and green, 

That swell her bosom's throb, 
.With trustful eyes and restful sighs, 

Her lips forget their sob. 
117 



THE LOST DREAM. 

Ah, dream, why didst thou tempt me; 

Why taunt me with the gleam 
Of unattainable beatitude. 

That real — too real — didst seem? 

Alas! 'tis gone forever; 

Forgotten — past — a blank ! 
That dream that haunts dim recollection's void, 

And left my forehead dank. 

I fain would sleep again ; 

And search in dreamland's caves 
For this buried treasure that escaped 

The mind's wrecked architraves. 

O Godl is life a dream; 

And dreams the truer life 
That, free from self-conceit and interest, 

With purport grave is rife? 

Lord, let me ne'er wake ; 

But, dreaming, lie content: 
The hours I pass unconscious of my will, 

Are more than idly spent. 

Who knows what influence 

Each half-remembered vision 
May not have upon our tensile thoughts. 

When time wipes out division 

Between the world of dreams 

And facts? Yet why endeavor 
To summon back the dream departed, when 

Perchance 'tis lost forever? 

ii8 



DOROTHY. 

Oh, j'e gods ! be patient ; be patient — now she 

comes ! 
Beware ! beware ! Your thrones shall fall — her 

footsteps heaven hums ! 
Her face is like the morning; her hair is like the 

night : 
Oh, bend the knee, ye conquered gods ! bend to 

her presence's light ! 
Oh ! do ye hear her heart beat ? Oh ! do ye see 

her form 
Bright-looming through the mystery of passion's 

loving storm ? 
There is no dream of mortal, there is no speech 

of god. 
That, trembling in vain utterance, can half her 

grace applaud ! 
And yet poor / adore her — she whom the gods 

alone 
Are privileged to worship, low-kneeling at her 

throne ! 
What dream is this that blinds me? What joy 

is this that cries 
High and low and to and fro, and streams from 

her dear eyes? 
Oh, tears! if you must part me! Oh, sighs! if 

you must well 
From out my pulsing bosom ; go and her sweet- 
ness tell ! 



119 



WHEN THE LAST KISS IS GIVEN AND 
LOVERS MUST PART. 

The last kiss of parting 

Lies cold on my lips, 
Where its fragrance exhales 

All the sadness that slips- 
Like a soul to the grave, 

Deep down in my heart, 
Where hath Death left his sting 

And regrettings their smart. 

Oh ! why must our loved ones — 

Like blossoms of May 
'Neath the blasts of December — 

Fade slowly away? 

Why have we no magic 

Decay to defy; 
To bring back the glances 

Of love to the eye? 

As we fondly adore, 

Just so sadly we weep 
O'er the cradle by which 

We our lone vigils keep ; 

And the night hides our tears 

As the day sees our joy; 
For happiness ever 

Has pain in alloy. 

Yet the head that lies hoary 

With frost of the years, 
In the calm of the coffin 

Disproves all our fears, 

120 



For a touching refinement 

Spreads over the face, 
Whence the wounds of the world 

Have stolen their trace. 

The voices that once 

Wove a charm for our ear, 

Though now silenced forever, 
Are hovering near 

In the green recollections 

We cherish so dear. 
That the forms so long buried 

Seem still with us here. 

Oh ! far be the hour 

When remembrance shall cease 
To call back the children 

Who prayed at our knees ; 

Then with dream-eyes diffusing 

Faith's heavenly light, 
And soft arms round our necks, 

Kissed us sweetly "good-night." 

Then perish the grief 
That can find no delight 

In the treasures of memory's 
Mellowing flight. 

When the last kiss is given, 

And lovers must part, 
Oh, think not of digging 

Love's grave in the heart ! 



121 



IF I HAD THOUGHT. 

HI had thought your love could lie, 
I'd ne'er have let my virgin eye 
Rest on your charms, in simple faith. 
Where all love's dreams their madness trace ; 

My heart should ne'er have been exposed — 
Its passions chilled e'er half disclosed. 
I thought your lips the holy leaven 
My soul should taste and scoff at Heaven; 

I thought your neck the regal tower 
Where sweet oblivion marked the hour; 
I thought your breast the sacred choir 
Where no emotion sang for hire ; 

I thought your waist was made to hold 
By arms whose strength their worship told; 
I thought your thighs were molded pure 
By Grecian hands, 'neath eyes demure ; 

I thought your knees could never bend 
To kings or gods, nor courage lend 
To that base mind which thought to steal 
One smile from you, that e'er was real ; 

I thought your feet were made to tread 
Those paths of love whence doubt had fled: 
But, oh ! my heart was too replete 
To lay its treasures at your feet! 

And you forgot such treasures given. 
Though dross on earth are gold in heaven. 
Begone, cold maid ! I would not give 
One pang I've felt, that you might live 



To learn the worth of love unsought, 
That once was in your meshes caught. 
Too late, at last, you'll wake to crave 
A love whose truth defied the grave, 

But, unrequited, drooped and sighed 
Its life away below your pride ; 
Alone to suffer — to enjoy — 
The pains of love without alloy. 

Where now, false one, is all your boast? 
Your vaunted charm is but a ghost. 
Forever haunting every hour 
That taunts you with your vanished power. 



123 



THE MYSTERY. 

We were four friends ; our hearts were gay ; 
We'd wandered from the painful way ; 
And late at night sat ling'ring long 
O'er sparkling glass and merry song. 

When all at once our hearts stood still ; 
'Neath terror's shroud the buried will 
Lost all its power ; and dimly lit 
Did wafted spirits intermit. 

And, though our eyes were open wide, 
They saw not ; but the soul espied 
Through its clear windows such a sight, 
As never came before by night. 

Four angels stood in pure array ; 
Four devils barred their peaceful way; 
And on each angel face there grew 
The likeness of the loves we knew 

In each his manhood's earliest days, 
When passion touched us with amaze ; 
And in the face each devil wore 
We read our errors o'er and o'er. 

So near those seemed, yet these between 
Forbade approach, malignant spleen 
Portrayed upon each hideous face. 
In which no pity left its trace. 

And each of us, with one accord, 
Made mental peace with his own Lord, 
In vain attempt to brush aside 
Past evils and revenging pride. 

124 



Yet naughl availed till heavenly love 
Descended, and in anger, drove 
The demons from their vantage ground; 
While in the air and all around 

There came the sound of music sweet ; 
To make the vision more complete. 
And toward us, on unmoving wing, 
The lovely visitants did swing. 

And nearer still the angels drew. 
And o'er their forms a halo threw. 
Till in our hearts they vanished quite : 
Then out into the starry night 

Each man unconsciously essayed, 
And on the graves of dead love? laid 
The flowers of his fond regret, 
That lingered, all unfaded, yet. 



125 



EMELINE. 

Tall and stately, hearts beguiling, 
Eager suitors round thee smiling; 

Just a bending of thy head 
And another's peace hath fled. 

I've no gold to match thy beauty; 
Love for me must do wealth's duty. 

Gold has power, but hope has genius 
Safe to bridge the gulf between us. 

Destined only to observe thee, 
In my thoughts I daily serve thee, 

Wireless telegraphy 

From thy heart embold'ning me. 

Dost thou think because I'm simple 
I've gone dafty o'er thy dimple? 

No, indeed, I'd not content me 
With such meager measure lent me. 

I must have thy utmost being, 
All thy inmost treasures seeing: 

So wilt thou then learn to love me 
For the faith that soars above me, 

Lifting on its dauntless wings 
All the gifts my poor love brings. 

Take my humble sacrifices 
Rich in coin of love's devices; 

Let me be but ever near thee, 

Slow to grieve and swift to cheer thee. 

126 



THOSE PLEASANT HOURS. 

The pleasant hours I have spent 
Fond memories to me have lent ; 
Though withering in their swift decay, 
They have not borne my thoughts away. 

I think, and thinking, long in vain 
To have those hours back again. 
'Tis not to be : oh, cruel fate ! 
Man masters not his own estate. 

And yet, to linger where those charms 
Once held me in their blissful arms, 
Is joy enough ; and sweet content 
In each transporting vision's sent. 

Ho ! mortal, with prophetic eye ! 
Look on this happiness, and try 
To wish me greater — can there be 
A Nile queen for my Antony 

More lovely, loved, and wanton-wild 
Than my voluptuous fancy's child 
Like lilies on the silent pond 
That move not toward the stream beyond? 

Not to the swift the race is given : 
The stillest clouds float nearest heaven : 
The slowest river guards the stone : 
The rarest flowers bloom alone. 



127 



LUTIE. 

Dearest of dear girls, 
Staunchest of hearts. 

Love from your soft curls 
Speeding his darts; 

Lips full of meaning 
Tempting the kiss, 

Eyes that are faithful 
Lavishing bliss : 

Can any blossom 
Cling to the bough 

After the summer 
Fadeless as thou? 

Can notes so dulcet 
As thy sweet voice, 

Cry from the harp-strings 
Of minstrel's choice? 

God made thee lovely; 

Love made thee kind; 
Who made thee dauntless 

No one's divined. 

Words have no language 

Fit to convey 
Half that I long for 

With you away. 

Dear, how I love you! 

Flower and song 
Sing you and scent you 

All the day long. 

128 



Stars beam no brighter 
Than your true eyes; 

Burdens grow hghter 
When you surprise 

Sadness in mine, love : 
Oh! how my heart 

Yearns for your arms, sweet, 
When we're apart ! 

So may we wander. 

Loving and brave, 
Down through life's valley, 

Clear to the grave. 



129 



WHEN SCOT FORGETS HIS MOTHER- 
TONGUE. 

A TOAST. 

(Written for the Fifty-fifth Annual Banquet 
of the Illinois St. Andrew's Society, at Chicago, 
November 30, 1900.) 

When Scot forgets his mother-tongue 

Long, doubting years have tried 
His fealty, and cruelly 

The fates have scorned his pride. 

Can he forget, then, even yet. 

The heather and the blooms. 
The thistle of his boyhood's days, 

The winds that o'er the lombs 

Of Scotland's brave, departed sons, 

Sing glories of the past 
To hearts that grieve till friends relieve 

Their memories at last? 

Ah ! would man lift to fading lips 

A rose that sought decay? 
Has Scotland ever raised a hand 

To drive her sons away? 

St. Andrevir's been our patron saint 

These fifty years and more ; 
The lock we once saw, dark and thick, 

With silver's sprinkled o'er. 



130 



But still our hearts are young and blithe, 

And year by )'car we meet, 
In sweet forgetfulness, to seek, 

And worship at her feet, 

Dear Scotland's goddess — fellow-love — 

From angry passions riven : 
To our adopted country, drink ! 

To Scotland ! and to Heaven ! 



131 



LOOKING THROUGH A LADY'S SHUT- 
TER. 

Looking through a lady's shutter, 
"Heaven is fled to earth!" I mutter; 
"Can it be that my poor eye 
May such lines of grace espy?" 

Rising from her bed of ease, 

First I see her dimpled knees 

Straighten o'er her dainty feet 

That, treading, make the floor grow sweet. 

Bending o'er, her loosened hair 
Breaks in locks of black despair; 
Then, in all her regal height, 
As sunbeams part the shades of night, 

Forth she stands, a goddess, drest 
In her pure draperies of rest. 
White as wings of angels driven 
By ethereal winds' of heaven. 

Now she doff^s her raiment: dare 
Man gaze upon a form so fair? 
Why did God design to fashion 
Charms that blind the eye with passion? 

But this glimpse of fields Elysian, 
J.Iaddening the tottering reason — 
Just a glimpse, that makes me doubt 
What my senses are about — 

Quickly disappears, as tresses 
Deftly binding, swift she dresses ; 
One by one those nameless things 
Passing, cloudlike, o'er her wings; 

132 



Till she is an angel still, 
V\^ho must all one's being fill, 
But in garments, soft and queenly 
All appealing to him keenly. 

This is all that through the shutter 
I could see — no lips can utter 
Rhapsodies that half explain 
How I'd love to peek again ! 



135 



OUR SISTERS-IN-LAW. 

Staid lady of matur'ed charms, 
And voice all tremulous with the years 

That soft have touched the sweetest chords 
That ever melted song in tears ; 

And hair of wistful, silv'ring sheen, 

That lends a halo to the face 
So long belov'ed for the thoughts 

That on it all their beauties trace; 

Or matron mild whose blossomed love 
Twines round dear, helpless baby forms, 

Or o'er some little grave at night 
Cries softly to the God of storms; 

How many eyes have closed in sleep, 
To dream of loves that died in waking? 

Ah ! that long loneliness of heart, 
When with love unrequited breaking) 

Oh ! youthful maid, of love afraid, 
Surprising in your vernal bloom, 

In whose brown hair and cheeks so fair 
The coldest one could fear his doom; 

Why should we be so happily 

Repaid for maritated care. 
And j'ou, all lonely, bear the blast 

That withers your soul's roses there? 

Why should our meals be garnished rich 
With love and plenty, when your fate 

Is but to shiver and despair, 
Outcast and single, at our gate? 

134 



I bow my head before that source 
Of poverty, pain, wealth and health — 

Unworthy I, who dare not be 
Full grateful, but give thanks by stealth. 

Yet dearly loved as earth of God, 
You all, dear sisters, shed the rays 

Of pure, unselfish sympathy 

Upon our sorrow-darkened days. 

Forever blest with kind unrest, 

You minister to us in need 
With heart and hand — nor question ask — 

Sweet charity your only creed. 

We hear your voices on the stair, 
Our children's laughter in the garden ; 

Instinctive gratitude is sown 
In hearts no chilling world can harden. 



135 



CATHERINE. 

My pen must falter when it tries 
To draw thy loveliness on paper. 

'Tis not thy forehead, nor thine eyes, 
Thy winning ways, nor waist so taper ; 

Nor does thy wisdom nor thy wit 
Explain the touch that makes us start : 

All these were wondrous, were it not 
So plain they fade before thy heart. 

When beauty, on thy pearly cheek, 
Throws out its signal of alarm. 

No red rose in its rarest bloom 
With such a blush the eye may charm. 

Heav'n preordained thee, and no sage 
Has yet been sent to tell us why 

Some birds survive to sing and love, 
While others, silent, loveless, die. 

What is this charm that holds us so ; 

That \vants no reason, lots no fear 
Nor doubts assail us, while we may 

Behold and worship and be near? 

'Tis but the heart — tlie Christ-born heart, 
That yearns toward all, and suffers none 

To go unloved: 'Tis ever thus 
The reverence of the world is won. 



136 



SHALL WE MEET? 

(A Song.) 

Shall we meet; shall we meet 
Where the bright waters greet 

The decline of the amorous sun? 
Time is fleet; time is fleet! 
But it lags with slow feet 

Where true hearts to love's trystings still run. 

Just a kiss! just a kiss, 
Which you never will miss, 

But I'll cherish so longingly aye! 
O the bliss of that kiss! 
O the bliss of that kiss 

Ne'er can fade like the flowers of May! 

Refrain : 
Sweet dear ! dearest sweetheart ! 

How I love you ! How I long 
For the hour when mem'ry kisses 

All the charms that round you throng! 



137 



WHY MUST WE FORGET WHEN WE 
SHOULD REMEMBER? 

Why must we forget when we should remember, 
Why must we remember when we would forget ? 

The roses of June are the dreams of December ; 
The snows of the winter in summer gleam yet. 

The loves that are dead fill our souls with their 
presence ; 

The joys of today are soon wasted and fled; 
The sorrows we mourned, now a purified essence. 

Are cherished, transfigured, by memory fed. 

The face that we once thought the sweetest from 
Heaven, 
In the cold of the grave seeks its slowly decay ; 
But the heart that was true, aye from earthly 
faults riven, 
In the still of the night bears our longings 
away. 

What we have we will love but when time has 
defeated 

Our delinquent desires, that e'er blossom too 
late ; 

And ne'er shall we heed, though so often re- 
peated. 
The lesson of life nor the teaching of Fate. 

Then take to thy heart the delights of the hour, 
And treasure no more vain regrets for the past : 

The defects we now see, if regarded, will flower 
In doubts and misgivings to shame us at last. 



138 



PEARL. 

Cradled in some shaded creek, 
Where no careless eye may seek, 
Safe-ensconced in guileless shell, 
Many a priceless pearl may dwell. 

Seasons have for such a one 
Naught of flowers and their sun, 
Naught of winter's stinging cold ; 
Nor do fears of growing old 

Feed upon its grace sublime, 
That but glorifies with time, 
Ne'er for aye to feel decay 
Till the world has passed away. 

Mortals must acknowledge all 
Beauty has resistless thrall ; 
But this pearl does not compart 
With another, far more fair, 

That with soulful eyes and kisses, 
Honeyed words and nameless blisses, 
Warm as summer's sun-lit plains, 
Warmer still when summer wanes ; 

Draws me as no pale pearl could 
To the cottage and the wood; 

There as lovers did, to do : 
And this rarest Pearl is you. 



139 



TO MY VALENTINE. 

The butterfly builds no nest, 

And the kingbird has no throne; 
But the butterfly's wings and the kingbird's song 

Tell of you alone, alone ! 

I walk in the twilight's rest 

When the stars for grief atone ; 
And the zephyr brings, the woods along. 

In the nightingale's low tone : 

"Be my valentine! be my valentine; 
I will be yours ; you shall be mine — 
I love! I love! I love!" 

I'll don love-wings of brightest hue 
And fondly hover over you, 
Like angels from above. 

And may my sighs, like serpents' eyes, 
Beguile your spirit, where it lies. 



140 



TOGETHER IN ONE BED WE SLEEP. 

My little son, may angels keep ! 
Together in one bed we sleep ; 
And as we side by side recline, 
His young heart throbs ahead of mine. 

And every star that overhead 
Holds watchful vigil o'er the dead 
In distant splendor, seems to shine 
Down on him with a ray benign. 

Sweet child, who, from my being made. 
Against my guarding heart hath laid 
Thy little head, with face aglow. 
At morning and when evening's low 

And brilliant sunset gilds the gloom 
Of the dread, melancholy tomb ; 
For thee I pray. Thy slumbers grace 
The silent beauty of thy face. 

Some things I've thought, and left unsaid, 
Sometimes by rules been blindly led ; 
But O ! fond parents, list to me : — 
The myriad leaves that part the tree. 

In the next season are replaced. 

And nature's barrenness effaced. 

By new leaves that no eye can tell 

From those which from these branches fell; 

But one dear child you've learned to love — 
If he but dies, no power above, 
Nor any miracle on earth, 
Can mend your desolated hearth. 
141 



Those ej'es that with their Hquid hue 
Made heav'n look pale and dull to you, 
And magic smiles of infant might 
That you, and only you, could light ; 

Where can you find their counterpart 
In nature or inanimate art? 
Take care, that when the time shall come 
To break the solemn ties of home, 

No mocking memories may rise 
To cloud the future's untracked skies. 
My wish is this : May I and mine 
Together prosper or decline. 

Together work, together play, 
Together wander where we may ; 
Till underneath the grasses deep 
Together in one bed we sleep. 



142 



SPES MEA CHRISTUS. 

On the crescent shore of Naples' wave-kissed 
sands, 

In the sunny month of April showers, 
I met a little maid whose hands 

Were filled with wanton flowers. 

There was something reverential in her carriage, 
As the blooms stirred fragrant to her breath ; 

They were not suitable for marriage; 
Nor were they meant for death. 

Much engaged in speculation on their meaning, 
I approached, and asked her where she fared, 

Like a Ruth from floral gleaning, 
With her round arms bared. 

With holy eyes transfixing my enchanted gaze, 
And hands raised slowly to the sea-blue sky ; 

"Spes mea Christus," low she says, 
With soul-inspiring cry. 

"What mean those lilies pressed against thy 
eager face, 
Sweet, dreaming child?" I gently asked her 
then, 
As with a slow and measured pace 
She wandered on again. 

"Spes mea Christus!" hast'ning with expectant 
air 

And arms extended, her young faith revels 
In its own marvels — high and far 

I heard the Easter bells. 

143 



"Spes mea Chnstus !" dropping on a dimpled 
knee, 
She kissed tlie flowers and crossed her dainty 
arms ; 
And a deep hush came over me, 
With all of memory's charms. 

I saw the Christ arise again in majesty 
From the dark coldness of his earthly tomb. 

And change man's blackest tragedy 
To a celestial doom. 

I kneeled me down beside the simple, trusting 
child, 

Enrapt and of my presence unaware; 
And all that tempted or defiled 

My spirit left me there. 



144 



ON THE BANKS OF ST. JOE RIVER. 

On the banks of St. Joe River, 
Where the waves gleam cold by night, 

And the dim trees seem to shiver 
In a weird, unholy light ; 

I had laid aside my palette 

As the flaming sun went down, 
And the soft'ning shades of even 

Threw their glamour o'er the town: 

When the ever-growing silence 

Of the empty woods and fields, 
Wrought that mystic transformation 

Which the dreaming spirit yields. 

And the overhanging willows 

Into eastern temples changed. 
While the distant lights, like windows. 

Through their swaying branches ranged. 

The faint lowing of the cattle 

Came like far cathedral bells, 
And like melody the rattle 

Of the pumping at the wells. 

The tall grasses waving round me 

Seemed like figures passing by, 
And the oaks upon the hill-top 

Stood like tow'rs against the sky. 

The low ripple of the river 

On the pebbly beach below, 
Grew the lapping of the ocean 

Where the lamps of Venice glow ; 

145 



Though wild, restless, virgin waters 

Fascinate and trouble me 
More within their native fastness 

Than where wedded to the sea. 

The white ducks that, greed-belated, 
Paddled homeward down the stream, 

Were the sails of quaint fellucas 
Floating slowly through my dream. 

Now my thoughts, by time unfettered, 

On the wings of fancy Hy 
To the land where sylphs unlettered 

'Neath the vine and olive lie. 

There I sigh again with passion 

For that black-eyed, dark-skinned maid, 
Who in such bewild'ring fashion 

Her young charms before me laid. 

So, the vibrant zephyrs, sighing 

'Midst the foliage overhead. 
To my memories replying 

Like the voices of the dead ; 

Tell again the golden story 
Of when love to art appealed ; 

And old scenes of youthful glory 
In the gloaming stand revealed. 

Pure ambition's dormant pulsings 

Throb again within my heart ; 
And the sun of conscious greatness 

Shines again upon my art. 



146 



When the late moon tips the tree-tops 
And comes flooding o'er the crest, 

And the shadows rock and shimmer 
On the river's purling breast ; 

I can see the Doge's Palace's 

Long reflection in the tide, 
Where strange boats, of many colors, 

'Mongst gondolas gaily ride. 

The bright clouds that pass, quick-scudding, 
On their journeys 'cross the moon, 

Are the domes of that fair Venice 
Glist'ning o'er her bay at noon. 

The. hid nightingale's soft cadence 

Wafted gently on the air, 
A sad gondolier's love-lorning 

But addresses to me there. 

Where, oh. memory's thy repining! 

Where, O time ! thy heartless chain ! 
What alloy in this sweet cloying 

Which here visits me again? 

For the banks of St. Joe River 
Have far vanished from my view : — 

Of my darling days my darling ! 
I can see but you — but you ! 

Oh ! — of my darling days my darling ! 
I can hear but you — but you! 



W 



THE DYING YEAR. 

Ring bells! oh, ring bells! 

For the dying year — 
Dawn Cometh swiftly ; 

Death low-hovers near. 

Wake ! O ye echoes 
Of the days long o'er ! 

Harbingers mystic 
Of days now before. 

Though many flowers 
Ne'er can bloom again, 

Though many hours might 
Brighter far have been; 

Weep not ; Oh ! weep not ! 

Other buds will come ; 
New loves will blossom 

In some fairer home. 

Let no regrettings 

Mar the peaceful close ; 
Wrap in oblivion 

All your weary woes. 

Dream on ; Oh, dream on ! 

Through the misty past, 
Mingling hope's smiles with 

Mem'ry's tears at last. 



148 



TOASTS. 

Here's to old friends cherished 

And to new friends made : 
Drink! to the flowers of friendship; 

May they blossom ere they fade. 

Here's to the maids who eat our bread. 
And round our board contentment shed ; 
Whose little mouths are never dry, 
Yet begging always till they die : 
May they not miss, in Heaven's cloister, 
The ruby wine and juicy oyster. 

Stay! ladies, stay! till night is o'er 

And we can see to drink no more ; 

Your wanton charms twine round our hearts. 

As the grape-vine clings to the arbor's parts. 

One more drink before we sever 
Tend'rest ties that bound us ever ; 
May their mem'ries leave us never. 
While our hands can raise the glass. 

To sunset skies and women's eyes 

I drink, and toast their wonders; 
While love within me multiplies, 

And all their beauty plunders. 

Here's a toast to the ghosts of good fellows de- 
parted. 

Who are with us in spirit, tho' absent in form : 
Oh ! cold is the heart where regrets ever smarted, 

Which wine cannot mellow, nor memory warm. 

J49 



Here's to Spring's diurnal pansy, 
At whose birth love drinks to fancy; 
Lip to lip, steal love's sweet potion 
Hidden by the wine glass' motion. 

"When your lips are wet, you need not fret 

O'er care's increasing weight ; 
Do but lift the glass, and joys enmasse 

To laugh to shame dry fate. 

In cozy places lift the vases 

From which nectar spills. 
While pretty faces leave their traces 

On unguarded wills. 

Lift high the bowl, and let us quaff 
To the pretty face with lips that laugh ; 
To the eyes that melt with am'rous passion, 
To drown in bliss the hopes they fashion. 

Pass round the loving cup, and let 
Each silly boy and gay soubrette 
Their lips with binding nectar wet ; 
So they'll remember to forget. 



150 



MIDST THE EVENING'S RED AND GOLD. 

Where the glinting leaves of summer 

are all dancing in the sun, 
And the softly-suing zephyrs 

come and kiss me one by one, 
Underneath the slanting shadows, 

where, breeze-blown, the grass is rolled, 
I have builded me a temple 

midst the evening's red and gold. 

Its high dome is the blue heaven 

stretching to the horizon, 
And its altar is the green hill 

I so fondly gaze upon ; 
Its choir is songs of birdlings 

soaring homeward to the nest ; 
A.nd in this fair, wild elysium, 

all my troubles are at rest. 

There are no invented pleasures 

can successfully compare 
With the myriad balmy odors 

of the circumambient air ; 
And no half-remembered visions 

from the past eternity, 
That hold half the consolation 

this dear temple offers me. 

There the mavis and the nightingale, 

with unrestricted lay, 
Make melodious the vaulted woods 

through all the night and day; 
The clouds evolve strange pictures 

from their ever-changing forms ; 
And the wind's long diapason 

runs from soothing calm to storms. 

151 



Sweet nature is my preachei, 

and her only text is love, 
With her points illuminated 

by the iris on the dove; 
And the wild flow'rs nod approval, 

while the bull-frogs croak "Amen"; 
And the brooklet laughs, "I told you so", 

all down the verdant glen. 

'Tis better far to lie and dream, 

untrammeled and unknown, 
Than to conquer men by tragedy — 

to die upon a throne; 
The narcissus and the hollyhock 

more brightly deck the dell 
Than could all the glittering baubles 

hung upon the road to hell. * 

I can hear the wings of angels 

hov'ring closely o'er my head, 
Bearing back to Nature's worship 

the forgotten and the dead ; 
And their petals drop the roses 

and the yellow marigold, 
Deeply carpeting my temple 

with their streaming red and gold. 



152 



THE POET AT THE BANQUET. 

'Twas a memorable occasion, and the poet was 

sent an "invite," 
As a compliment from the rising sons to the 

dreamers that dream by night : 
The tables were spread where the roof o'erhead 

was blazoned with stars of old, 
And the waters flashed like diamonds, and richly 

the night-birds trolled. 
All the glitter and brawn of the city had in- 
vaded the sylvan shore : 
The women were walking fashion-plates ; all the 

men could handle an oar. 
There the poet shook as with mortal fright, but 

'twas not for fear the Muse 
Might desert him in his unusual plight ; but be- 
cause he smelt hot goose. 
Erewhile his longings are crowned with success 

as the waiters all appear; 
And the poet sighs, as, forlorn, he eyes, in place 

of his sandwich and beer, 
The luxuries of every clime heaped high on the 

silver plate ; 
And as wassail bowl pledged soul to soul, he 

simply ate and ate ! 
The mirth waxed warm ; the impending storm of 

encore awaited the joke : 
But the poet had dined, and at leisure reclined to 

simply smoke and smoke ! 
The wine went round ; the poet's part on the 

programme was last in rank; 
But the poor man clung to the bottle's neck and 

simply drank and drank ! 



153 



At last the toast-master tapped the wood and 

o'er all there fell a hush, 
While the nightingale took up the talc of the 

peacefully sleeping thrush. 
Then the poet arose in his well-worn clothes, and 

gazed around on his friends, 
With that cheerful squint which comes by dint of 

the charm completion lends : — 
"Dear associates of this enchanted hour, I could 

love you all and repeat ; 
Let the gods be praised and the dead be raised, 

for I've once had enough to eat ! 
Your goose is fine, and as for your wine, 'twould 

make a poet forget 
He was a poet: — if you know where 3'ou grow it, 

there's hope for the poet yet." — 
All nature has smiled like a little child on the 

winsome graces here ; 
The air is sweet, lambs cease to bleat, the moon 

is full and clear. 
The fire-fly gleams in the glimmering gloom, you 

can hear the night-hawk cry ; 
The owl hoots in the haunted woods, and th^i 

whippoorwills all reply. 
The cool waves creep from the chilly deep, to 

break 'neath a starlit sky, 
And the zephyrs reap on the erassv steep where 

the fragrant flowers lie : — 
But the poet is lost to their numberless host ; he 

has fallen down in his place ; 
His eyes are closed as the unblown rose ; no lily's 

as white as his face. 
And on it's a look such as none has beheld in all 

his long employ ; 
While a bright halo's spread all around his head 

• — for the poet has died of joy ! 
154 



WINTER THOUGHTS 

A PASTORAL 



WINTER THOUGHTS. 

(A Pastoral.) 

The snow lies white on the frozen grass, 
Where scurrying, fleet-limbed rabbits pass ; 
The chilled sun sets in a softened light, 
And the faint moon hangs in the van of night. 

The snow-bird plumes his frost-proof wing, 
The smoke curls upward, ring on ring, 
In the still air ; no sign is seen 
Of autumn's tints or the summer's green. 

The flowers sleep in the shelt'ring mold, 
And dream of the spring, when they unfold; 
The bitter cold a requiem 
Sings, vain and harmless, over them. 

The children peep through finger-holes 
On windows where Jack Frost unrolls 
His works of art, more weird and true 
Than artists e'er aspired to. 

The ground-hog hides ; the noisy duck 
Has fled the freezing of the brook ; 
The robin, in a warmer clime. 
Warbles of northern summer time. 

The trees their bare limbs naked wave 
O'er winter's birth and summer's grave; 
The squirrel cracks his hoarded nut 
In hollow oaks the fields abut. 

At night the burning tree stumps throw 
A fiery terror o'er the snow. 
Till timid children drop their heads 
'Neath the warm cov'rings of their beds. 

1 55. 



No plow disturbs the hardened loam; 
No stock the desolate pastures roam; 
Horses in the closed stables rest : 
The days with peaceful thoughts invest. 

The plow boy trudges off to school ; 
Now learns to read and write by rule ; 
Ciphers slowly, makes love quick — 
Cupid outstripping arithmetic. 

The winter sports go on apace ; 
The apple and the maiden's face 
Take on that blushing hue and glow 
Common to both, by which we know 

They're ripe for lips to press, the hand 
To fondle, and the heart demand — 
Tender the time when first-love lures 
With its bewitching overtures. 

The farmer's wife, with sparkling eye, 

Prepares the succulent apple pie ; 

Happy to rule with gentle sway 

When her lord from labor, brood from play, 

At twilight wend their homeward way 
Under the snow-cloud's quiet gray. 
Peace reigns here, no recreant part 
Straying from neglected heart. 

Here every little woe is cured 
By saintly wisdom, love-matured ; 
Here every little joy is blest 
With finished duty's honest zest. 



IS6 



Troubles forgot, with mirthful noise 
Celebrate the girls and boys : 
Theirs the mild province, given of God, 
To reap contentment from the sod. 

The wood fire crackles on the hearth ; 
Its friendly glow fills all their earth ; 
Past enmities forgiven lie : 
All evil passions childless die. 

Such is the heaven contentment makes 
Of sylvan shades and sun-swept lakes, 
That every hour seems linked with fate 
To crowd with riches man's estate. 

Sorrow and pain must have their place 
In the brief passing of each race ; 
But where they're met with sturdy pride, 
Sorrow and pain may not abide. 

At early dawn the farmers rise 
And read the portent of the skies : 
The victims they of all her freaks 
When tickle nature vengeance wreaks 

In summer, when the crops exposed 
Show not as yet God's will disclosed ; 
In winter still the habit stays 
To haimt the ease of idler days. 

Oh ! traveler on the briny deep. 
By restful motions rocked to sleep. 
Visiting points of fair renown, 
Wand'ring the whole world up and down; 



157 



Your sleep is waking, visions mild, 
Beside those of a country child ! — 
Beauty spreads transforming hands 
Diversely o'er divergent lands ; 

But weaves no charm that can compare 
With the plainest farm where children are ; 
Where woods and fields give all their wealth 
To fill the bins of rustic health. 

There the river laves its grassy brink 
Where lowing cattle pause to drink; 
The firefly lights his elfin lamp, 
And all of childhood's fairies camp. 

Thought lingers fondly o'er the scene, 
And memory paints the picture green; 
And shadows from that sunny past 
Soften the way to the grave at last. 

When the ice is strong the lusty shout 
Of red-cheeked skaters sounds without; 
And corn-silk, smoked in corn-cob pipe, 
Betrays the youth of bolder stripe. 

The church bells, on each Sabbath morn, 
Vibrate across the standing corn ; 
Until 'tis husked ; and then the tone 
Carries along the void alone. 

Tremulous with its message kind 
To every list'ning ear and mind. 
Solemn the sound : the answ'ring husK 
Lures the shy partridge from the bush 



158 



Where rest her mates in safe retreat, 
Far from man's sacrilegious feet — 
A sanctuary of the snow 
That onlj' they and heaven know. 

Oft when the preacher stops to dine. 
With buttermilk in place of wine. 
The children scarce can stay their knives 
Till tlie long blessing's end arrives. 

Many a time in after life, 

Though victors in a city's strife. 

They'd part with all their fame and might 

To feel again that appetite. 

Each cot contains its lovers' bower 
Where smitten swains forget the hour : 
Their hair-cloth sofas well suffice 
For city stage of public price. 

Young-love runs riot where there's naught 
By which the mind or eye is caught : 
The unfed sense that invvfard glances, 
The graces of the heart enhances. 

How cool the bloom on maiden's cheek 
To lips that heavenly pleasures seek 
In eartlily angels full as shy 
As any that patrol the sky ! 

He who in doubtings lays him down 
In fertile fields or stagnant town. 
And dreams not dreams of unwept joy 
That never can the spirit cloy; 



159 



Should haste at once to city spire ; 

There breathe a prayer, and quick expire — 

Better the dead a thousandfold 

Than they whose hearts no solace hold. 

All men must die — he only lives 
Who from his soul some rapture gives ; 
Some thing of beauty leaves behind 
To glorify the rising mind. 

Yet village churchyards, filled with stones, 
With broken hearts and crumbling bones, 
Differ in no way from those others 
Which consecrate to city brothers 

The little child that died unnamed, 
The tomb that age and greatness claimcd- 
There all are gone, and linger yet 
Naught but the ashes of regret. 

Oh ! could we but believe in time 
What poets tell in nimble rhyme. 
That joys are fleeting, and each hour 
Records the death of some dear flow'r; 

How sweetly would we love and weep, 
And every mem'ry sacred keep 
From cold disdain and thoughtlessness. 
And every good intention bless ! 

Treasures of purse are but a snare 
To lead us to temptation's lair. 
And better a crust in homely peace 
Than all the armored fame of Greece. 



1 60 



The farmer harnesses his team, 
And down the hill, across the stream, 
Takes his full sleigh of farm produce ; 
To bring back goods of household use. 

With eager expectation wait 
His wife and children at the gate : 
No fairy gifts so rare as the 
Unopened bundles' mystery. 

The supper simmers on the stove, 
Forgotten in this treasure-trove ; 
And exclamations of delight 
Draw the soft echoes of the night. 

Questions answered, team put out, 
The children gather all about ; 
With laughter each draws back a chair, 
Forthwith attacks the simple fare. 

The farmer beams with conscious pride. 
Well pleased his substance to divide 
With those he loves ; more blest to give 
From his small store than to receive. 

Boyhood and manhood, father and son, 
Though separated, still are one : 
The infant traits of female child 
In future mothers are compiled. 

Who can conceive on virgin brow 
Maternal cares which preface now 
The self-denial bound to come — 
That love sj^nonymous with home? 



i6i 



Yet new homes rise for everyone 
That passes from us, as the sun 
Its light continuously breaks 
In new conceptions o'er the lakes. 

Bed-time, that bugaboo of youth. 
Undeniable, like naked truth, 
Once in each day stops every mind 
To virtue or to vice inclined. 

Oblivion temporarily 
Claims animals of each degree : 
Both man and beast its power own, 
And leave their cherished plans alone. 

Thus on the farmer's humble cot 
A darkness falls that darkens not — 
When heaven descends, man's spirit flies 
To mix the pigments of the skies. 

For dreams are dreams ; a thing apart 
From any will of head or heart ; 
And blessed he whose soul can keep, 
Unchanged, the sweet repose of sleep. 

When sitting, manuscript in hand. 
To write the virtues of the land, 
A thousand mem'ries o'er me rush 
To put my falt'ring pen to blush. 

What brush can paint, what words portray, 
The glories nf each new-born day. 
Differing like each single hair 
Upon the brow of beauty fair? 



162 



What soul can hold, what heart define, 
The splendors of sun-purpled vine? 
As easily might one count the glints 
The sun upon the snow imprints ! 

So, wordless and with dreamy mind, 
Upon some verdant bank reclined, 
How oft I've watched the magic change 
Of Nature, through her endless range. 

In ceaseless wonder ! — When the stream 
Reflects and ripples the bright beam 
Of sunny noon-time; when the lark 
Seems to fall downward with the dark; 

When little stars come one by one 
To hold their candles to the sun ; 
When the sad willows softly sough, 
And birds dream restless on the bough; 

When katydids with soothing "cry" 
To other katydids "reply ;" 
When the wild mammals roam the wood 
For their precarious livelihood : 

And man, alone, lord of the beasts. 
Profanes night with unholy feasts — 
Then, then ! my heart, too full to take 
All Nature's gifts at once, must break ! 



163 



FINALE. 
YALE, FAREWELL! 

Dear old Yale, good bye ! 

I'll love thee while I'm living; 
My heart outburns mine eye 

In tears of parting giving ; 
Yet shall we meet where memory sweet 

Entwines her charms about thee ; 
Though distant in some far retreat, 

I shall not be without thee. 



164 



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